




























































































* 






























«* 


t 











I 

















• . -• 













Watching until certain that the Mexicans were looking another 
way, the three men would steal from bush to bush. 












































r& 

Bu. 

c<, fr 


Copyright 193 3 

Turner Company 


AUG 131935 

©:iH 85458 ^ 






-"•A-CJ .'a-O 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER PAGE 

I Over the Bar -------- 1 

II Ashore - -- -- -- -- 6 

III On to Goliad.14 

IV The Clouds Lower - -- -- -- 21 

V Coleto ------ ---31 

VI Capitulation -------- 43 

VII A Half Minute.52 

VIII “Soldiers Three”.62 

IX Nature Is Hostile.73 

X Alone.83 

XI Utopia!. 9 3 

XII The Barrier .101 

XIII Fire and Blood.109 

XIV Mirages.118 

XV A Cabin by the River.123 

Appendix. 131 





























Chapter I 


OVER THE BAR 

“ White water dead ahead, Sir!” 

There was a note of restrained anxiety in the 
helmsman’s gruff voice, raised to sound above the 
eerie shriek of the gale through the taut gear, and 
the metronomic cr-e-e-ak-rasp, cr-e-e-ak-rasp of 
swinging tackle blocks. 

Eating into the very eye of one of the series of 
“blue northers” which had lashed the Gulf coast 
through the early weeks of the memorable winter 
of 1835, the Texas war schooner Invincible was 
beating sturdily toward the haven that lay some¬ 
where in the grey-blue smother to windward. 

Slanting through the spume, her lee rail awash, 
the dingy little craft clung sturdily to her course, 
footing ahead at a snail’s pace, though the helms¬ 
man was holding her close into it. Occasionally 
a comber, larger than its fellows, cuffed her trim 
nose off the wind, but she seemed to brace herself 
and wallow stolidly on as though conscious of her 
responsibility. 

Responsibility! If it appeared to weight the ship, 
what of the master? Standing back of the steersman, 
l 


2 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


a squat figure in oilskins, his bearded face unflinch¬ 
ing before the lash of the gale, the Captain reckoned 
his chances. 

Wind, water and the hour of the day all were 
adverse. On the night before he had scowled for 
hours over the chart his friend Monroe, master of 
the Amos Wright , had made three years previously. 
In his mind that chart stood out clearly—also the 
warning notation, “Five to nine feet of water over 
the bar at Aransas. North winds hold the water 
back.” 

North winds! Well, the Invincible had them on 
her. 

That bar! The Captain thought of it and scowled. 
If nine feet, or eight, or even seven, perhaps well 
enough. 

But if five—but five with the breakers running 
clear across as they would be certain to be? 

The Captain leaned over and stared at the com¬ 
pass, then ahead to where, a mere blur in the murk, 
a low spit of sand showed momentarily, at intervals. 
That would be signal point. Monroe’s directions 
said: “In running for the bar, bring the pole on 
Singal Point W-N-W and run for it till the pole 
on said point bears S-W by W. Then run in for 
it.” (I) 

“Pole on said point . . . run for it.” That when 
a man’s eyes had to be good to make out even the 
shore line. 

The Captain swore into his wind-tousled beard 
when, displacing the freezing slop that had been 


OVER THE BAR 


3 


drizzling down, a light skift of snow whitened the 
Invtncible’s deck, molded fringes on her frozen 
rigging, descended from aloft and drifted leeward 
when a slatting sail slapped it off in the form of 
crisp, white powder. 

Wind, water, the bar, and now the snow to curtain 
in the point! It was too much. A master must jam 
on through the thick of it, and be damned to it. But 
he must keep his planks under him; and to run 
blind where a man needs two pairs of eyes to- 

Then responsibility again! Tucked away in the 
hold was his unseaworthy cargo in the form of 
a company of Kentucky riflemen sent from Valasco 
to join the force Fannin was raising at La Bahia for 
the invasion of Mexico. 

“White water dead ahead, Sir,” the helmsman 
prompted again, though he must have known full 
well that the Master had seen all that he had seen. 

The Captain raised his shaggy head and his voice 
came full and confident: “A-l-l right! Go ahead!” 

The spirit of the Texas colonists was surging 
within him. Viewed in connection with the circum¬ 
stances he faced, the words he spoke might well 
have been adopted as the motto of an indomitable 
people who knew how to face regimented adversities, 
and carry on. 

Fannin was needing those Kentuckians. 

All right, then; go ahead! 

The brave little schooner bored into the reek of it, 
yawing and fighting back as the land currents com- 



4 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


menced worrying at her. Unwinking eyes fixed on the 
spot where the land had last been seen, the Master 
spoke but once. “Ease her off a few points,” he 
ordered, when the spit loomed for a fleeting instant, 
an indistinct mound on their starboard bow. Then, 
“hold her there,” as she steadied on the altered 
course. 

Minutes of nerve-wracking strain when the erratic 
land breeze shifted unexpectedly, almost taking her 
aback. Seconds of breath-taking uncertainty when 
she pounded dully on the bar with each jerky 
forward motion, and mast timber creaked protest 
and the singing braces grew rigid as iron rods, under 
the strain. A half minute of complete helplessness 
when breakers on either side roared and clawed at 
her flanks; hauled her, first one way, then the other, 
like two gaunt wolf packs fighting over their prey. 

Then the helmsman spared one hand from the 
wheel to cuff chill sweat off his furrowed forehead, 
and the Captain jammed his mittened fists into the 
pockets of his sou’wester and spat explosively over 
the rail. 

They had crossed the bar. 

Having gallantly vindicated her name, the Invinci¬ 
ble came about smartly and went boiling up the 
channel on the starboard tack. Early nightfall found 
her anchored in a snug little harbor behind the 
southwest shoulder of Matagorda Island. 

The norther loosed his grip on Aransas and receded 


OVER THE BAR 


5 


southward, muttering. The stars paraded in advance 
of a full moon that etched the Point in sharp, clean 
outlines and transformed the distant breakers into 
an undulating ribbon of silvery lace. 

Sentineled by scattered live oaks, the dismantled 
fortifications Jean Lafitte had erected on the island 
lay ugly and sinister—fit stalking grounds for the 
wraiths of the pirate chieftain and his rake-helly 
crew. At the shoreline, the short wooden piling to 
which Lafitte’s smallcraft once had been moored still 
dangled their rusty chains in the light wash as 
though awaiting the rover’s return. 

No more would the freebooters scud through 
Aransas Pass to rig ships, and divide loot, and swig 
wine, safe from pursuit. But Romance and Adven¬ 
ture still hovered about Matagorda Island, though* 
moonlight and quiet and peace lay upon it. 

The Captain broached a keggy of black New Orleans 
rum, drank a gobletful of it neat, and tumbled into 
his berth—utterly contented. 

He had fought the good fight. He had kept the 
faith. Across the calm bay, lay Copano. And Fannin’s 
Kentuckians were going on through. 


Chapter II 


ASHORE 

The Kentuckians were disembarked at Copano, gate¬ 
way to La Bahia, San Antonio de Bexar and the rich 
territory west of the Colorado. 

Among the first to set foot on the flimsy dock was 
a muscular, eager-faced stripling in his late ’teens 
whose clear eyes and deeply tanned skin marked 
him as one who had spent a well-ordered boyhood 
in the open. Nestled in the hollow of his shoulder 
was a long-barreled rifle of the pattern favored by 
the woodsmen of his native state. The butt plate 
and trigger guard of the gun were of polished brass, 
and brass-lidded cavities in the side of the stock 
provided receptacles for the percussion caps and 
grease patches. The shot pouch and polished cow- 
horn powder flask secured to his trim shoulders by 
broad picturated leathern straps, also were metal 
trimmed, and in a flawless condition that reflected 
the pride of their youthful owner. 

Listed on the company roster as J. C. Duval, this 
youngster had won the admiration of his comrades 
by his expertness with the rifle, demonstrated in 
frequent competition with the older marksmen. 

6 


ASHORE 


7 


Among the officers, it was admitted that he was not 
quite the model soldier, as he detested drills of any 
kind, and, though never actually mutinous, was 
possessed of an indolent, irresponsible nature that 
caused him to chafe under discipline. Neither lazy 
nor vicious, he had a boyish idea that the first duty 
of a soldier was to fight with a gun. He knew that 
he could do that, and do it well. As to how to handle 
a rifle or pitch a tent or follow a trail, he was inclined 
to place confidence in his own methods, rather than 
in the “Manual of Small Arms,” or other books 
printed by the tacticians for his enlightenment. 

In short, young Duval did his work well, shirking 
nothing, enduring hardship and privation without 
complaint, and, now and then, overlooking a military 
regulation which appeared to him foolish or unneces¬ 
sary. “A good colt, but not more than half broken,” 
his Captain had said of him, upon one occasion when 
young Duval had been cited for a minor infraction 
of the rules. Then the officer had added, wistfully, 
“Even if he does get a little out of line now and 
then, it would be a mighty fine thing if this army 
had a few thousand more fellows just like him.” 

Released from their confinement in the limited 
quarters of the Invincible , the freedom-loving Ken¬ 
tuckians swarmed over the sun-bathed little port to 
stretch their limbs and trade gossip with the few 
inhabitants. How was Fannin coming along with the 
army he was building for the invasion of Mexico? 
What was the latest information as to what was 


8 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


taking place south of the Rio Grande? In their 
enthusiasm, there was no doubt that a Texas army 
would cross the border. But, when would it start, 
and how far would it have to go before encountering 
the Mexicans? The year 1835 had been a season 
of triumph for the colonists. In the minds of these 
men from the “states”, 1836 would witness the final 
clean-up, with a chastened Mexico paying tribute 
at the muzzles of her invaders’ guns. The Ken¬ 
tuckians were eager for assurance that they would 
participate. 

Such answers as were received were vague, and, 
in a measure, disquieting. Fannin had announced an 
“expedition to the West” which was to have assem¬ 
bled at San Patricio, January 24 to 27. Something 
had happened, and the scheme had been abandoned 
or postponed. Santa Anna had been at Vera Cruz. 
There had been a rumor that he had recently reached 
Saltillo, on his way to the Rio Grande—either to 
repel expected invasion, or turn invader. At the 
latter suggestion, the Kentuckians snorted disdain¬ 
fully and patted the stocks of their long-barreled 
rifles suggestively. 

Mexicans coming to overrun Texas, eh? 

Maybe so. 

Having done more than his share of the work when 
his company pitched camp on the bluff back of the 
dock, Young Duval looked Copano over, and was 
not favorably impressed. Having been told that it 
was the most important port in southwest Texas, 


ASHORE 


9 


he was surprised to find it little more than a cluster 
of weather-dunned shacks, with a warehouse and 
water tank. 

After he had finished his inspection of the port, 
Duval paid a visit to the camp of a company of 
Texas rangers, who also had pitched their tents on 
the bluff. Among them was a leathery old fellow 
with an enormous spiraling moustache and a face 
like a knife, who informed him that they had been 
on the frontier for more than six months during 
which time they had subsisted on beef and game, 
without a morsel of bread or vegetables. Returning 
to his own quarters, Duval explained the situation 
to his Captain, who sent him back to the rangers’ 
camp with a supply of hard tack. Though the damp 
air of the Gulf had caused this bread to become green 
with mold, the rangers devoured it greedily. After 
noting that those hard-bitten fellows appeared to be 
in perfect physical condition, Duval was inclined 
to believe, with Byron, that Man is a carniverous 
animal. 

The effect of this scene on Duval was sobering. 
At Velasco, he had been told that a well-equipped 
and amply provisioned expeditionary force was being 
assembled here at Copano. Instead, he found a hand¬ 
ful of half-clad men for whom Texas had not even 
taken the trouble to provide flour or meal. 

Three thoughts registered themselves on the 
young Kentuckian’s impressionable mind. 

First: The fertile lands of Texas surely produced 
sufficient food to supply the simple wants of her 


10 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


servants. Her defenders were on a scant and poorly 
balanced ration. 

Second: Though these veterans were a close- 
mouthed clan, it was apparent that they had little 
faith in the proposed expedition to Mexico. 

Third: Though they were but little more than 
half fed and slightly less than half clad, these 
happy-go-lucky rangers did no grumbling; and 
about them was an atmosphere of good-natured 
camaraderie that caused the Kentucky recruit to 
resolve that, some day, he would be a ranger, too— 
and, perhaps, live six months on beef and game, and 
grin whimsically while telling about it. 

These were more than rangers. They were men! 

Late in the day, target practice was held, after the 
rifles had been thoroughly cleaned of the damp 
accumulated in the Invincible's hold. Though drills 
of any sort were an abomination to Duval, rifle 
shooting appealed to him as something practical, 
besides being the pastime that he enjoyed most. 

The men faced the target one at a time, and with 
them it was a serious business. Some of the rangers 
had strolled over from their camp to witness the 
affair, and the credit of the company was at stake. 

Their commander had set a high standard. Five 
hits out of a possible five at a two-inch target was, 
to him, clean work, at a hundred yards. Four hits 
were fairly good, and three acceptable. The man who 
sent fewer than three bullets into the little square of 


ASHORE 


11 


paper, or whose piece did not bark briskly in proof 
that his loads had power, earned an official frown, 
and was, in a measure, disgraced. 

At the conclusion of the practice Duval was one 
among four who had perfect scores. Proud of the 
approval he had read in the rugged faces of his 
mates, he was leaving for his tent to clean and oil 
his beloved rifle, when his commander recalled him. 

For some time the Captain had been conversing 
with a group of the rangers, who had been interested 
spectators. The officer’s eyes were twinkling when 
Duval came up to where they stood. “Duval,” he 
said, “how many holes do you reckon you and that 
long-barreled pet of yours can punch in a two-inch 
paper, at twenty paces, using but one bullet?” 
“Two,” Duval answered, smiling. (2) 

“Correct. I’ve been telling these ranger fellows 
that our schoolboys over in Kentucky can do a little 
trick like that. They’re too polite to come right out 
and call me a liar with their tongues, but their eyes 
say it. Suppose you show ’em.” 

<c Oh, all right.” 

Though he had answered casually, the youngster 
was secretly a-tremble with excitement. The prestige 
of the company was a precious thing, and his com¬ 
mander had staked it confidently on his marksman¬ 
ship. Should he succeed, he would be the hero of 
men who considered proper riflemanship to be the 
acme of manly attainment ; did he fail, all the gibes 
and taunts he would hear later would not be entirely 
good natured. In fact, to fail in the presence of 


12 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


“company” who themselves were no novices, would 
be something approaching high treason. 

Duval made his dispositions carefully. A square 
of paper with a half-inch dot in its center was pinned 
to the boll of a blasted live oak tree, on a level with 
his shoulder. In front of this target, he drove his 
thin-bladed sheath knife vertically into the bark at 
an angle that caused its razorlike edge to cross the 
dot on the paper. 

Duval now loaded his rifle with unusual care, lest 
loose wadding or a badly seated bullet bring him to 
grief. The old-time black powder was measured 
meticulously in the hollow of his hand and rammed 
home and wadded tightly to secure compression. 
The “home-molded” bullet followed, wrapped 
neatly in a thin “patch” of greased leather to protect 
the rifling in the barrel and insure accuracy. After 
the tube had been cleaned and primed-, the brass cap 
was adjusted over it, and the hammer lowered to 
hold it in place. 

Ready! 

His comrades stood silent, motionless as Duval 
walked to the firing line, their strained faces evidenc¬ 
ing the importance they attached to the trial. Though 
the trick now was exposed, some of the rangers still 
were skeptical. The edge of a knifeblade will split 
a bullet, of course. But you must first hit the edge 
of the knifeblade. 

Old Kentucky must show them. 

Reaching his position, Duval fell into the peculiar 
slouchy stance of the Kentucky woodsman—left arm 


ASHORE 


13 


fully extended along the barrel, right elbow elevated 
above the level of the shoulder, head tilted sharply 
to bring the cheek to the stock. Though a moment 
before, he had been trembling from head to foot, 
the old oak stump was no more immobile than he 
became when he felt the butt-plate nestling against 
his shoulder. 

The muzzle of the gun swung up to a level, 
steadied, spat snappily. There was the ring of lead 
on steel and the paper fluttered down. The captain 
picked it up and emitted a throaty chuckle that was 
sufficient announcement of the result. 

Striving manfully to be casual, Duval tucked the 
rifle lovingly under his arm and strolled away to his 
tent—between a double row of silent worshippers. 

From that minute on, he could miss a drill now 
and then, neglect to answer roll call, even be absent 
from camp without orders, and nothing would be 
said about it. 

A king can do no wrong. 


Chapter III 


ON TO GOLIAD 

The Kentuckians found army life much to their 
liking, during the period they spent in and about 
Copano. Game and fish were abundant, and they 
greatly enjoyed the novelty of gathering oysters, 
with which the bay was well stocked. Yet, so eager 
were they to join Fannin and see service, that there 
was much enthusiasm in camp when the order came 
to prepare for the march to La Bahia. 

Up to that time, the men had given little thought 
to military tactics or soldierly bearing. The whole 
enterprise into which their adventurous spirit had 
led them, had appealed as an opportunity to see 
more of the world and pit their rifleskill against that 
of a hated and despised foe. 

But now, the seriousness of actual warfare 
weighted them, and their commander was anxious 
that they should make a proper showing when they 
joined Fannin’s better trained force. So they stepped 
briskly off along the winding trail, maintaining a 
semblance of military formation, and cramping their 
free-acting bodies into soldierly postures. 

Still reluctant to drill, Duval was in his element 
14 


ON TO GOLIAD 


IS 


when the Captain detailed him to precede the little 
band as one of the scouts, shooting any big game 
he encountered. To his delight, he found the country 
overrun with deer, which were so unused to the 
sight of Man that they seldom did more than raise 
their heads and gaze curiously, when approached. 
(3) Within a half-hour, he killed a fat buck and 
dragged it into the trail to be picked up by his 
comrades. Before noon, he had shot two more, care¬ 
fully selecting the largest and fattest males. 

In addition to the game, Duval found wild horses 
in great droves, some of them superb animals much 
larger than the ordinary plains mustangs. Far more 
man-shy than the deer, they would gaze at him 
for a time at a safe distance, galloping off in a roll¬ 
ing dust cloud when he came too near. A horse lover 
by instinct, as were and are most Kentuckians, Duval 
attempted to stalk a magnificent black stallion, the 
leader of a small band he found feeding in a glade. 
He had been told that a bullet placed high, just 
forward of the withers, would shock a horse’s spinal 
column, bringing him down, and rendering him 
helpless, temporarily. Not pausing to consider that 
a horse is no part of a foot soldier’s outfit, he spent 
several hours trailing the stallion from feeding 
ground to feeding ground. Once he found the band 
dozing in the lee of a cluster of spreading live oaks, 
while the leader stood immobile on a near-by knoll. 
Though he approached with the greatest caution, 
and from down wind, before he could get close 
enough for the nice gun-play necessary to success, the 


16 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


equine lookout sensed his presence. Head high, great 
eyes conning the landscape suspiciously, expanded 
nostrils sifting the stiff breeze, the horse stood for 
a time, stamping irritably, every fiber of his sleek 
body tensed. Then he trumpeted a shrill warning and 
whipped off the knoll. Swinging into their flying 
leader’s wake almost with the precision of a squadron 
of cavalry, the band pounded out of sight, and were 
seen no more. 

The incident strengthened Duval’s determination 
to become a ranger. To mold himself into one of 
those rugged frontiersmen, and ride a horse such as 
he just had seen was, in his boyish mind, an ambition 
worthy of any man. After the war, he would attain 
that goal, no matter if it took him ten years to get 
his commission. Not once did he consider the possi¬ 
bility that an invader’s bullet or saber would inter¬ 
fere with his plans. The Kentuckians had come to 
Texas to spend a little time whipping the Mexicans. 
All that remained to be done was to get the Mexicans 
in line with their rifle sights. 

Old Kaintuck would show ’em. 

At first the route was a winding trail along the bay 
shore. By mid-afternoon, they were following the 
meandering course of the Aransaso (4) river 
through a picturesque country with wooded hills, 
with here and there stretches of prairie, dotted with 
small patches of timber, which the inhabitants 
referred to as “islands.” 

The company covered about twenty miles that 


ON TO GOLIAD 


17 


day in its sedate march along the flat. Duval must 
have done double that distance, ranging the country 
ahead of them. Sunset found them camped on the 
bank of the river at Refugio, which then consisted 
of a few dozen adobe shacks, and a mossy church 
that had been built in the same year that Philadelphia 
was founded, so the padre informed them. Lazily 
contented, amid indescribable squalor, the town 
appeared somehow strangely immune from the 
political turmoil and racial animosities raging else¬ 
where. 

The people, about half of whom were Mexican 
and the remainder Irish, greeted them with great 
friendliness, and, that night, honored them with an 
open-air dance, which a majority of the soldiers were 
too tired to attend. The warm-hearted Irish opened 
their hearts and their homes to the visitors, plying 
them with all that the place offered in the way of 
food and drink. Whatever may have been hidden 
within the secretive minds of the Mexican menfolk, 
there was no doubt that the senoritas there, as else¬ 
where, greatly admired the big, brave “gringos”— 
a fact that may have caused many a Mexican to 
instinctively take sides against the Americans, when 
came the time when every man was forced to make 
his choice. 

Having rollicked and feasted with the dancers until 
past midnight, Duval tumbled onto his pallet of 
leaves, hoping that his commander would allow 
a little laxity in the morning. But the Captain had 


18 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


retired early and gotten a good rest. Instead of slow¬ 
ing down the day’s program, he appeared bent upon 
impressing the revelers with the fact that this was 
no pleasure excursion. Rousing his men at an un¬ 
usually early hour, he set a fast pace and allowed 
no lagging. However, when, late in the afternoon, 
he came to an attractive site, with an abundance of 
good water and live oak timber, he made camp, 
greatly to the relief of some of the trailwom men. 

Though he had again covered many more miles 
than those in the ranks and still felt the after effects 
of his social activities at Refugio, Duval was up late 
again, this time prompted by curiosity. Camped 
near by was a band of Caranchua Indians, who pro¬ 
fessed friendliness, and appeared eager to fraternal- 
ize with the pale-face warriors. The Kentuckians 
were willing to chat, but felt unable to reciprocate 
the friendship expressed, for a settler had informed 
them that the Caranchuas were cannibals—the only 
tribe on the continent who ate their kind. (5) 

Breechclouts constituted the sole clothing of these 
red men, blankets being added only when weather 
conditions so ordered. They were fine specimens of 
physical manhood, few of them being less than six 
feet in height. Lithe and muscular, they presented 
a ferocious aspect as they squatted about the fire, 
conversing in a peculiar jargon of guttural mono¬ 
syllables that appeared to be produced by a spas¬ 
modic action of the throat muscles, with small aid 
from the tongue and palate. They were armed with 
ornately feathered lances, and bows and arrows, a 


ON TO GOLIAD 


19 


few carrying old flintlock muskets that appeared 
entirely out of place in their hands. Though they 
denied having any hostile intentions, the Captain 
noted that no women or children were among them, 
so ordered out extra pickets for the night. 

Having done double duty through two days of 
unseasonably warm weather, and danced and feasted 
not wisely, but too well, Duval was exasperated to 
find that it was his turn to stand guard. He started 
for the Captain’s quarters to enter a protest, but 
thought better of it. This was war, and he would 
do all that was asked of him, shirking nothing—but 
the detested drills. 

But, as it turned out, it made small difference 
whose name the sergeant had written on the guard 
detail for the night. For, shortly after the little 
encampment had quieted, the elements conspired to 
keep everyone awake, and astir. First low in the 
distance, then nearer and more insistent, a weird 
humming sound gradually smothered the hoot of the 
timber owls and the mournful yapping of the coy¬ 
otes on the plain. Whistling through the crackling 
brush, a fierce norther beat down upon the unpro¬ 
tected men, bringing them out of their blankets to 
hustle for additional fuel. 

During the remainder of the night, a double spec¬ 
tacle was presented in that little wood—twin tableaus 
that aptly illustrated the divergent characters of the 
White and the Red races. The red conservationists 
built small fires and sat close to them 5 the white 
wasters built huge fires and sat away off from them. 


20 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


The best that either group could do was to worry 
through until morning, when the whites ate a hasty 
breakfast and resumed their march, leaving their 
neighbors of the night still huddled about their 
fires, wolfing half-cooked venison with hoglike grunts 
of satisfaction. 

Obliged to face the gale, and hampered by their 
accoutrements, the marchers made slow progress, but 
did succeed in warming their blood until they were 
more comfortable than when inactive in camp. 

A few hours later, Duval, who was a little way 
ahead, reached the crest of a knoll and sighted the 
dome of what he knew must be La Bahia mission. 
Whooping back the intelligence to the straggling line 
of men, he heard their lusty answering cheer and 
saw them come on with a rush, fatigue and priva¬ 
tion forgotten with the announcement that journey’s 
end was near. A half hour later, the company 
marched through Goliad, and took quarters in a 
stone building near the old church. 

The doughty little Invincibl^s cargo had been 
delivered to Fannin. 


Chapter IV 


THE CLOUDS LOWER 

Goliad, then a Mexican village of some two thou¬ 
sand inhabitants, was located on the south bank of the 
San Antonio River, almost directly opposite the site 
of the American town, which was built some years 
after the war. The place was a huddle of adobe huts, 
with here and there a flimsy “jackal” of poles, in 
which miserable peons managed to exist. 

In sharp contrast to their sordid background, the 
presidio arid mission stood sturdy and majestic, as 
though kept coolly aloof by the hedge of traditions 
that surrounded them. 

At once, these venerable structures became the 
object of young Duval’s avid curiosity. From the 
surly old Padre and others, he learned that, in 1722, 
Marquis San Miguel De Aguayo established the 
presidio Sante Marie de Lorete de Le Bahia del 
Esperitu Santo on the site of La Salle’s old Fort St. 
Louis. The mission Esperitu Santos was planted near 
by. He learned that, in 1725 these institutions were 
removed to the valley above Victoria, and, in 1749, 
brought to Goliad. To a boy whose father had seen 
Kentucky change from a wilderness to a prosperous 
21 


22 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


commonwealth within a few decades, this was like 
viewing the Temple of Solomon, or some other 
Biblical structure. It appeared to him almost a sacri¬ 
lege that Fannin had strengthened and modernized 
the fortifications to some extent, and that Anglo- 
Saxon riflemen now were quartered where Latin 
lancers once paraded. Half old-day Spanish, half 
new-day Texian, “Fort Defiance,” as it was called, 
was as a man dressed in an old Roman toga and 
wearing a modish hat, tie and gloves. 

But Duval quickly found something to occupy 
his time other than by ruminating over the contrast 
between the old order and the new. Three hours of 
their first morning in Defiance, and two that after¬ 
noon, were spent in drilling, and Duval found no 
way to escape that onerous service. His company 
commander was sympathetic 5 but there were the 
New Orleans Grays in their natty uniforms—crack 
outfit of the command; the Tennesseeans; Captain 
(Dr.) Shackleford’s already-famous Alabamans 
(Red Rovers); Major Mitchell’s well-disciplined 
Georgians; Major Wallace’s “LaFayette Battalion.” 
The awkward Kentuckians must be brought to an 
equality with these more seasoned organizations. 
They must drill, drill, drill—Duval with the rest. 

But, the next morning when he was reluctantly 
starting for the parade ground, his Captain noted 
his downcast countenance and relented. “Man to 
man,” he said, his shrewd eyes twinkling, “I admit 
that I’d like to have a taste of venison for supper.” 
He chuckled when Duval wheeled and started to- 


THE CLOUDS LOWER 


23 


ward the river country, then called cautiously after 
him: “Must have fresh meat, you know; and the 
only way to get it is to go out after it. That’s all 
right, of course, but I wouldn’t let any officer see 
me, if I could help it” 

Taking the hint, Duval circled the old church and 
kept it between him and the drill ground as he 
double-timed toward the river. He had gone but 
a few hundred yards when, rounding a sharp turn 
in the dusty trail, he came face to face with a young 
officer who was hurrying toward the fort. 

Uneasy, Duval trailed his rifle to make it less 
conspicuous, and started to brush by. No use. To 
his disgust, the officer stopped and hailed: “Wait 
a minute, youngster! Where are you going?” 

“Nowhere in particular,” Duval answered, not 
knowing what else to say. 

“Well, just where, in particular?” 

Something in the smooth, steady voice caused 
Duval to look keenly at his questioner. He was 
young—not more than thirty, Duval estimated. His 
face, frank, open and genial, still had something 
in it that forbade trifling. Straightforwardness, self- 
reliance, energy, indomitable will power fairly 
radiated from the man, and about him, too, clung 
that elusive, intangible something that grips and 
pulls and holds other men as a magnet clamps par¬ 
ticles of steel to itself without actually clutching 
them. 

“I asked where you were going,” the level voice 


24 BACK FROM GOLIAD 

came again, as Duval gaped helplessly. There was 
no note of irritation in the tone, but only an in¬ 
flexible determination to be answered. 

“Oh, out looking around,” Duval found himself 
replying, evasively. With those cool, clear eyes on 
him, he couldn’t tell a flat lie. 

“And with whose permission?” 

Now Duval hesitated. Convicting himself was 
one thing, getting his Captain in line for a rebuke 
was another. He was about to admit truancy on his 
own responsibility, when the officer glanced at his 
fur cap and smiled slightly. “I see you are one of 
the Kentuckians. When you get back, tell your 
Captain that Colonel Fannin feels the need of a 
little roast venison, too. Give him my compliments, 
and tell him he is invited to dine with me—provided 
he furnished the meat.” 

Colonel Fannin! The famed “hero of Concep¬ 
tion,” and the idol of Duval’s boyish heart! The 
commander who was to lead on to Matamoros and 
flail Santa Anna across Mexico to the Isthmus! 

Duval stood in the warm spring sunshine gazing 
after the trim, alert figure as Fannin strode briskly 
around the curve of the path and out of sight. Like 
nearly five hundred others over there at the fort, he 
was his Chief’s for life—on through to death, if 
need be. Fannin might plan well and win; he might 
blunder and lose. It made no difference, so far as 
Duval’s fealty was concerned. 

That his commander had allowed him to go hunt- 


THE CLOUDS LOWER 


25 


mg was a favor not to be valued lightly. That he 
had seen through DuvaPs desire to protect his 
captain, and respected it by not pressing his question 
was more than something. It was everything. 

But Duval had yet to learn that Fannin’s char¬ 
acter had more than one facet. When he cut his hunt 
short and returned to quarters shortly after noon 
with a particularly fine haunch of venison, he de¬ 
livered the Colonel’s invitation to the Captain, and 
found that worthy not overly enthusiastic. 

“News for me, eh?” the Captain grunted. “Well, 
I got some for you, too. The Colonel dropped in 
to see me, after the morning’s grind. He didn’t 
say anything about that dinner invitation, but he 
did tell me that I am to drill you an hour extra 
each day for five days, till you and I have made up 
your lost time. 

“We start now.” 

The spectacle of an officer gravely putting one 
private through the manual of arms evoked merri¬ 
ment that grew boisterous, at times. But neither re¬ 
sented it. For it was just. Duval needed the instruc¬ 
tion, and the Captain needed it impressed upon him 
that five hours a day for every man meant just that. 
They grinned wryly and went through with it. 

And when the Captain dined with the Colonel, 
that night, there was perfect good-fellowship, and 
no mention of Duval’s escapade was made then, or 
subsequently. That was Fannin’s way. He could 
pay a compliment to one and administer a reprimand 
to another in the same tone of voice. He could re- 


26 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


spect a private’s feelings, and command respect for 
his own from a general. So, he smilingly ate his 
share of the illicit meat, and made the culprits pay 
for it. 

Gradually, the discipline tightened. The daily 
ordeal on the hot parade ground grew more in¬ 
tensive, and permits to visit the nightly fandangos 
in Goliad became more rare. The fondness of a 
junior officer for the latter events, coupled with 
his appetite for red liquor, resulted in the acquiring 
of a name for the, to then, unchristened Kentuckians. 

Out on a tour of the town one night, this young 
sprig drank more of the potent Mexican liquor than 
he could carry soberly. On his way back to the fort 
he encountered a Mexican who retreated into his 
hovel and barred the door, when the officer jostled 
him jocularly. Not to be deterred, the roisterer 
battered down the door and raged through the 
jackal y smashing the cheap furniture and chasing 
the occupants outside. Attracted by the noise, other 
Mexicans came from near-by houses to investigate, 
retreating and barricading their entrances when the 
big American turned his attention to them. He had 
beaten in a half-dozen doors and had the entire 
section in an uproar when news of the disturbance 
reached headquarters and a detachment was sent to 
restrain him. Because of his performance, the peons 
dubbed him the “Mustang,” or wild horse. In a 
short time, the name was applied to the entire Ken¬ 
tucky contingent, first by the peons, later by the 


THE CLOUDS LOWER 


27 


soldiers. So firmly was the sobriquet attached that 
it was written into official reports, and clings to the 
Kentuckians to this day. 

Then, suddenly, fandangos and fiestas and hunts 
were forgotten—even by Duval—and the private 
soldier’s conception of the impending struggle was 
turned topsy-turvy. Instead of going to Mexico to 
crush Santa Anna, they were to remain where they 
were, and, if they were able, prevent Santa Anna 
from crushing them. 

First, came an unconfirmed rumor that “The 
Napoleon of the West” was preparing to enter 
Texas with an army of ten thousand men. Later, a 
Mexican arrived from the Rio Grande country to 
report that Santa Anna had reached the river on 
February 12, and was about to cross at the head of a 
large army, which was to be divided into two sec¬ 
tions, one division directed toward Bexar, the other 
to thrust at Goliad. 

Rumor following rumor dispelled the sense of 
security that had enwrapped Goliad. Then stern 
fact displaced rumor, when a messenger from Travis 
brought the information that Santa Anna was con¬ 
fronting him at Bexar. 

Whatever their officers may have known previ¬ 
ously, this news changed the entire aspect of the 
situation, so far as the rank and file were concerned. 
The conflict they had come from the states to seek, 
was being brought to them upon short notice and 
with astounding rapidity. Knowing little of the criss- 


28 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


crossing opinion of the higher officers, and less of 
the clash of authority among the civil leaders, Duval 
and his fellow privates could only guess their 
destination when five days’ rations were issued to 
them, together with as much ammunition as they 
could carry conveniently, and, with his infantry and 
a field battery of four guns, Fannin marched out of 
Goliad. But, when they crossed the river by the 
upper ford and started toward San Antonio, they 
knew that their commander’s intention was to at¬ 
tempt a drive through to beleaguered Bexar. 

From the viewpoint of the man with the musket, 
the debouching of that little band from the timber 
into the winding westward trail was the pronounce¬ 
ment of his death sentence. That strange intuition 
which often guides a common soldier to a conclusion 
which his commander’s reasoning powers have not 
enabled him to attain told him that Bexar could 
not be relieved, no matter what Travis, or Houston, 
or even Fannin, might think or order. 

But there was no lagging, no muttering. Trudg¬ 
ing along with the others, Duval saw Fannin ride 
past, heard him speak a casual word, caught the 
spirit of him. If death was at the end of that sunlit 
trail, Fannin was ready to meet it. 

So, then, was Duval. So were the others. 

But something occurred up at the head of the line. 
It was explained afterward that an ox-cart carrying 
their meager store of provisions had broken down. 
(6) The men broke ranks and made camp, talking 


THE CLOUDS LOWER 


29 


little and thinking much, while their officers huddled 
and counciled long and earnestly. 

Whatever may have been the difficulty, it ap¬ 
peared to have been the grain that cast the balance 
against attempted relief for Bexar. For, when the 
council broke up, the Miistangs y captain rejoined his 
men with the air of one who bore a pardon or re¬ 
prieve to the condemned. “We’re going back, boys,” 
he said, gruffly. That was all. 

So, as they had marched toward certain death, 
they reversed and marched toward what might 
await them. 

It was orders. 

Having reoccupied Defiance, Fannin set about it to 
render his fort and his army fit for the struggle 
that he knew must come. His men were sobered, 
but in no wise dismayed. Willingly they tramped 
over the parade ground, foregoing all recreation for 
the sake of preparedness. As willingly they worked 
at the task of strengthening the fortifications. Addi¬ 
tional bastions were completed, and guns stationed 
on them. The walls were thickened, and the trench 
surrounding them deepened. A runaway was dug 
from the fort to the river, that water might be avail¬ 
able in case of siege. This passage was roofed with 
planking and soil, and a gun mounted to cover its 
outlet at the river. Though they worked feverishly, 
their task was far from completion when two colo¬ 
nists came in from San Patricio with the black news 
that Captain Grant and his company had been sur- 


30 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


prised there by a force of Mexican guerrillas, and 
the last man of them massacred. 

Following close, came a courier from Refugio, 
sent by the people of that pi ice to ask for an escort 
to Goliad, as they were in hourly fear of attack. In 
answer to that appeal, Fannin sent Captain King 
and his small company there. Hearing nothing from 
King, Fannin sent three couriers, one after the 
other, to search for news of him. None of the 
couriers returning, he dispatched Lieutenant-Col¬ 
onel Ward with the Georgia battalion of about one 
hundred and twenty men to relieve King. Like 
King’s men and the couriers, the Georgians marched 
away, and did not come back. (7) 

Then, one day when Duval and some of his mess¬ 
mates were completing the strengthening of a bas¬ 
tion, their captain stopped them. Within an hour, 
every man about the fort was at work, tearing down 
the defenses they had so painstakingly built. Having 
waited longer than was prudent for the return of 
King and Ward, Fannin was preparing to abandon 
them to their fate and obey Houston’s order (8) to 
fall back on the settlements on the Colorado. One 
more tradition was to be added to the store encom¬ 
passed by the mossy walls of Esperitu Santo. 


Chapter V 


COLETO 

Having dismantled his fortifications and destroyed 
such stores and munitions as his limited means of 
transportation failed to accommodate, Fannin evacu¬ 
ated Defiance, in compliance with Houston’s order 
to do so, and after the presence of large bodies of 
the enemy in the neighborhood on the preceding 
day had made it manifest that Ward and King 
never would rejoin him. 

Proudly serving as a flanker in the little advance 
guard, Duval watched the straggling line of men 
and the ox-drawn carts and guns cross the San An¬ 
tonio. Wallowing through the uncertain footing of 
the lower ford, they snailed past Manahuila Creek 
to the big prairie which reached to the timber bor¬ 
dering the Coleto, which Duval knew was some nine 
miles away. In the van rode Captain Horton with 
a couple of dozen troopers, fit and well mounted. 
Behind them, the infantrymen swung easily along, 
their pace regulated by that of the over-loaded 
cattle. The artillerymen walked beside the pieces 
and caissons, occasionally heaving with their shoul- 
31 


32 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


ders to aid the straining teams through a bit of diffi¬ 
cult going. 

As a reconnaissance by the cavalry before dawn 
had demonstrated that the way was clear, only 
ordinary precautions were taken against surprise. 
Protected by a front and a rear guard proportionate 
to its strength, the little army left the timber and 
wormed sluggishly along the meandering prairie 
trail. 

The hours dragged by. Sweeping away the morn¬ 
ing mists, a keen north wind brought chill dis¬ 
comfort to the men, but was a mercy to the laboring 
beasts. In his position on the front and to the right 
of the main body, Duval stopped occasionally to 
turn his back to the wind and chafe at the slowness 
of their progress. There was no occasion for alarm, 
of course. Bands of Mexicans were known to be 
about 5 but, should any of them collide with the 
Mustangs y that would be their misfortune. 

The Coleto timber now was paralleling their trail, 
on the left, and some two miles away. Slightly more 
than that distance on ahead, the road would meet 
the curve of the timber, and a stop doubtless would 
be ordered there. Duval anticipated food, a smoke 
in the shelter of the trees, and a game of cards with 
his comrades. Perhaps he could get permission to 
do a little deer shooting. With that thought in his 
mind, he chanced to glance to the rear, and was 
surprised to see that the little army already had 
halted. Thinking that they would come on, soon, 
he sat down on a little knoll to wait. Then he noticed 


COLETO 


33 


that the teams were being outspanned and turned 
loose to graze. Wondering that a dry stop should 
be made when water was so near, and a (9) little 
exasperated that the expected relaxation on the creek 
had been postponed, he followed the example of 
the other flankers and point men, who already were 
rejoining the main body. 

Duval’s mind was relieved when, upon joining the 
others, he noted that no camp preparations were 
being made. Too tired to graze, the cattle stood 
motionless, breathing heavily. The men lounged on 
the grass, grumbling mildly, as even the best of 
soldiers are wont to do. Some of the officers knotted 
for a time and a few of them held some sort of dis¬ 
cussion with the Colonel. There was no formal 
council, and no evidence of a serious debate. 

After an hour, the partly-rested cattle were yoked 
and hitched and the march resumed, with Fannin 
in personal command of the rear guard. Duval 
watched enviously as Horton’s bullies spurred on 
ahead and disappeared into the border of wood. 
Lucky devils! He could visualize them making a 
desultory inspection of the creek bottom to select 
a camp site. Then they would build a fire and lie 
at ease while the infantry shuffled along with pro¬ 
voking deliberation. Never mind. Some day, when 
he had become a ranger, a sleek, wiry horse such as 
those they rode, would carry him to where he 
wanted to go. 

When he had become a ranger! He smiled at the 


34 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


thought that never had been dismissed from his 
boyish mind. He might get to be a ranger-corporal, 
a sergeant, perhaps even a- 

Behind him a man called out something indis¬ 
tinguishable in a voice that held a faint note of 
excitement. A wave of quiet comment buzzed along 
the line. Looking back, he saw one of Fannin’s aides 
pointing to the rear with his sheathed sword. 

The line stopped. Gaping with the others, Duval 
saw two (10) mounted Mexicans who had emerged 
from the Coleto timber a mile or so behind them. 
They sat motionless in their saddles for a time, then 
rode back into the cover. 

Again there was no particular uneasiness, but 
rather the curious interest prompted by their first 
glimpse of a uniformed enemy. A tall Kentuckian 
next to Duval sighted his long rifle at the distant 
specks, grinning as he pretended to pull trigger. A 
laugh rippled along the ranks as he repeated, 
clownishly. 

Obviously it was a pair of scouts. Behind them, a 
sizable force might be coming on. Well, let ’em. 
Old Fannin would know what to do. 

A small body of lancers appeared from the timber 
at a point slightly in advance of the spot where the 
two scouts had entered it. As they deployed in 
platoons four deep upon reaching the open and came 
rapidly on, followed by squadron after squadron, 
Fannin brought his rear up and unlimbered his guns, 
turning the cattle loose. At the same time, another 



COLETO 


35 


and denser stream of cavalry debouched from the 
wood to the left, (11) troop following troop until 
it appeared they would fill the prairie. Snaking 
over the plain, these two lines passed Fannin’s posi¬ 
tion, then changed front and swung their advances 
in to inclose him on three sides. Meanwhile, other 
squadrons from the timber deployed to complete his 
encirclement. 

With favorable ground upon which to operate, 
Urrea’s squadrons had maneuvered with beautiful 
precision. To meet the menace, Fannin’s men had 
been thrown into a hollow square, with lines three 
deep. Inside that living wall the artillery was in¬ 
stalled, together with the cattle and carts. Outnum¬ 
bered, unfavorably situated in a depression, beset 
by what appeared to be an endless stream of enemies, 
they were suddenly sobered—set for the struggle. 

Against Fannin’s orders, a field piece opened with 
some effect, as the enemy completed the building 
of his trap. As though the Mexican commander had 
been reminded that he must come to grips at once, 
a bugle sounded, then another and another. Pennants 
fluttering in the cutting wind, trumpets braying, 
three lines of dragoons leaped into action, converg¬ 
ing upon the Texian’s position at a full gallop. Op¬ 
posed to them stood a taut line of untried volunteers 
whose first fire-test was about to be made. 

Strengthened by small details from other com¬ 
panies, the Mustangs made one wall of the square. 
In addition to their rifles, the front rank men had 


36 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


been provided with bayonets and short muskets, 
called escofetas. These formidable pieces were laid 
aside, to be held in reserve against the time when 
the enemy might be about to penetrate their lines. 

Grim-faced, crouching like so many cougars, and 
as dangerous, the Kentuckians waited while that 
avalanche of straining horseflesh and potential hu¬ 
man butchers flowed toward them with a rush that 
appeared to be irresistible. 

Stationed in the front rank, young Duval gripped 
his beloved rifle and trembled in the knowledge that 
one man-width of that immobile square was his to 
guard. Above the pounding roll of the tamping 
hooves out on the plain, he heard some one pass 
behind him and his Captain’s quiet voice: “Hold 
your lead, boys, and let ’em come close in. We’ll 
handle ’em.” 

The Captain passed on. The dark wave on the 
prairie swept in closer, till individual animals and 
their riders could be picked out of the mass. They 
were within a quarter of a mile now and coming 
on faster than ever, as though they knew they had 
entered a death zone which they must cross within 
seconds, if at all. 

At three hundred yards, Fannin’s artillery opened 
from two corners of the square, slashing the on¬ 
coming line with grape and cannister till their front 
rank became a milling jumble of riderless horses 
and horseless men. Ramming through that ruck, 
fresh platoons swept on as though by force of their 
initial impetus. 


COLETO 


37 


But the infantry was in, now, <heir rifles speaking 
in a steady crackling above which rose the occasional 
roar of a cannon. His gun hot in his hand, half 
stifled by the powder fumes, Duval saw the charging 
line falter, halt hesitatingly, then plow on against 
the leaden current. Dotting the prairie with dead 
and dying, it came in as a comber comes, and broke 
against that living barrier as a comber breaks against 
a seawall. 

Throwing aside their rifles, some of the first-rank 
men sprayed their front with slugs from the esco - 
; patas . Here and there where the two forces made 
contact, a Mustang came out of his crouch to drive 
his bayonet home, then went to his haunches again, 
to allow his comrades of the two rear ranks firing 
room. In the throes of death, a riderless horse nearly 
penetrated the Mustang line, falling broadside on 
before it when a lank Kentuckian smashed its skull 
with his clubbed musket. Shouting mingled orders 
and curses in a high, thin voice, a little Mexican 
officer who had been set afoot rallied a squad of 
the dismounted ones and burst out of the smoke 
directly in front of Duval’s position. Catching up 
his escofata , unused until then, he fired into the 
brown of them, just as the ranks behind him erupted 
in a blast of flame and smoke and hurtling lead. As 
though cuffed away by some mighty unseen hand, 
the little squad reeled back into the smokecloud and 
were seen no more. 

Along the Mustangs* front, rifle fire slackened 
and finally died when the powder-saving Ken- 


38 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


tuckians no longer found an enemy within range. 
The artillery blared for a time longer, then grew 
silent. The smoke thinned, drifted away, disclosing 
out front a barricade of dead and dying men and 
horses almost sufficient in itself to protect the beset 
force against a second charge. A few riderless horses 
galloped aimlessly about $ a few unmounted men 
raced desperately to get out of range. Here and 
there, a body writhed among the still forms sur¬ 
rounding it. Behind Duval, the Captain spoke again: 
“Good work, youngster. I had my eye on you.” 

To his own surprise Duval laughed loudly—a 
laugh that, somehow, appeared to belong to some 
one else. “Had your eye on me, did you?” He 
pointed to where he had thrown his escopata. “Then 
maybe you saw that old blunderbus kick me through 
the two ranks behind me. I had her loaded with 
forty blue whistlers, with powder in proportion, and 
she sure outwrestled me.” 

Then he sobered, suddenly. “Any of our boys 
hurt?” 

“A few, maybe,” the Captain answered, gruffly, 
then passed on along the line, directing his men to 
clean their rifles, while they could. 

Twice more that day, the enemy cavalry charged, 
followed by the infantry which was to flow through 
the gaps it made. Each time the result was the same. 
The dragoons would be battered by the Texan’s 
artillery and stopped once they came within rifle 
distance. After worrying their retreat, the Texan 


COLETO 


39 


artillery would train on the enemy infantry, sweep¬ 
ing the plain clean of it. 

Even the privates among the volunteers could see 
the Mexican commander’s predicament. His strategy 
being to sacrifice heavily to insure quick victory, he 
had made the sacrifice, and gathered no fruits. The 
more of his cavalry he employed in those thunder¬ 
ing charges, the greater his losses. His infantry 
simply could not exist as a unit within reach of 
Fannin’s riflemen. Another futile onslaught or two 
would erase the tremendous numerical advantage 
that had been his at the outset. Upon even terms, he 
knew well that Fannin’s men would launch an attack 
that would demolish him. That the cocky conceit 
which prompted his first onrushing attack had de¬ 
parted from him, was demonstrated by his next 
operation. 

Dismounting, a considerable body of the dragoons 
formed a thin skirmish line which opened fire as it 
closed in gradually on all sides of the square. Their 
marksmanship was poor, and their inferior (12) am¬ 
munition was ineffective, except at close range. All 
they accomplished was to worry the volunteers, 
hold them in formation, and prevent them from 
moving—which would be to the advantage of the 
Mexican commander, who, of course, expected re¬ 
inforcements. 

So futile was their attack that it was practically 
ignored. 

But, suddenly, men commenced falling here and 


40 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


there about that grim square. More intrepid than 
the Mexicans, a number of Indians had crept 
through the tall grass to locations that made hits 
easy. A rounded knoll a little way from the Mus¬ 
tangs* position became a vantage point for the most 
destructive of this sniping. Duval’s Captain, a noted 
marksman, was detailed to attend to the matter. 
Taking position back of a gun carriage, he brought 
his exceptionally heavy Kentucky rifle to a ready, 
and waited. For a brief moment a tufted head ap¬ 
peared above the crest of the knoll and a rifle blared. 
The Captain’s piece blended in with the report of 
the other, and he sat down to reload. The Captain 
fired four times, then returned to his company with 
a finger missing from his right hand. No more 
lead sang across from the little elevation. 

The musketry on the plain subsided to a desultory 
long-distance bombardment that did no damage. Sun¬ 
set came, then dusk. Fannin ordered a sortie which 
drove the last of the attackers back to the timber, 
where a line of fires marked their camps. The Cap¬ 
tain’s four victims were found on the knoll, each 
with an ounce ball in his head. ( 13 ) 

The enemy had been whipped soundly. With the 
numbers standing as they were, Fannin could have 
whipped them again, the next day and the next. 

Sometime after nightfall Duval listened with the 
others while Fannin made them a short speech. He 
told them that the enemy was completely demoral¬ 
ized, and that he had no doubt of their ability to 


COLETO 


41 


fight their way through to the creek. Then he put 
the matter up to them. 

Nearly every sound man in the command had a 
relative or two among the wounded, who could not 
be taken along, as the cattle had stampeded during 
the engagement, and Horton had not returned with 
his horses. (14) Listening to the discussion—in 
which the Colonel took no further part—Duval 
knew what the decision would be. 

The vote was taken. It was announced that they 
would stay with their wounded, come what may. 
Fanning merely nodded understanding^ when in¬ 
formed of the result. As on the day when he started 
to aid Travis, the fighting commander had been 
overruled by his councilors. As on the former oc¬ 
casion, he allowed their wishes to override his judg¬ 
ment and desire. 

Opposed as he was to remaining in the untenable 
location, Fannin set about it energetically to fortify 
his position. Through the night the men worked 
unceasingly, throwing up an earthwork that was 
impervious to infantry attack. Laboring with the 
others, Duval wondered what good would come 
of it. Suppose they did sustain themselves there for 
a day, a week—even a fortnight? Inevitably the end 
would be that daily attrition would cut them down, 
even if they had munitions and food with which 
to withstand a siege, and they had neither. But, the 
decision had been made. As Fannin did, Duval ac¬ 
cepted it and would do his share. 


42 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


All night the wounded begged piteously for 
water. The dead lay unburied. (15) Artillery am¬ 
munition sufficient for two rounds remained in the 
caissons. The riflemen were but little better sup¬ 
plied. They had scant food, and no transportation. 
The cruel breath of the North cut through their 
insufficient clothing and there was no fuel. 

But Fannin’s boys were standing by their helpless 
comrades. 

Himself wounded, and realizing the futility of it, 
as they, perhaps, did not, Fannin was standing by 
with them. 


Chapter VI 


CAPITULATION 

Stealing over the Coleto battlefield, ( 16 ) grey 
dawn slowly unmantled the spectacle grim war had 
made. Gaunt and hollow-eyed, Fannin’s men laid 
aside the tools they had plied unceasingly during 
the night. A few ate sparingly of the uncooked food, 
their desire for it suppressed by the more torturing 
pangs of thirst—made even more poignant by the 
incessant pleas of the wounded for water. In the 
strengthening light, the surgeons performed a few 
hurried operations which had been impossible during 
the darkness of that long night of horrors, and 
administered opiates—their only means of easing 
fevered pain. 

The last lingering shadows on the prairie retreated 
to the wood and the first sunrays fingered the waving 
blue-green oaks tops tentatively. His shovel still in 
his toil-numbed hand, young Duval straightened 
from his labor when a movement at the timberline 
caught his glance. 

They were coming again. With the others, he 
dropped his tools, threw on his pouch and powder 
horn and caught up his rifle. 

43 


44 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


The officers moved among the men, delivering 
a few low-voiced commands that brought that square 
wall of the day before into alignment. Battered but 
intact, and determined as ever, Fannin’s little army 
was ready. And, this time, it lay behind an earthwork 
that would stop rifle lead. 

The dark mass at the edge of the timber spread 
and came on—a skirmish line of infantry, massed 
cavalry, and- 

Artillery! Polished brass guns glinting in the early 
light as they reached the open. It was the expected, 
the inevitable; yet stern faces grew stony and low 
exclamations sounded about the square. Their toil 
through the night had been worse than futile. 
Smashed by those guns, the wagon frames with 
which their earthwork had been reinforced would 
be transformed into fragments far more destructive 
than the missiles that shredded them. 

The first spreading mass on the prairie grew 
stationary, and another and another formed till 
Fannin again was enveloped. Fresh units of infantry 
were identified (17) as the Mexican force closed its 
coils, pythonlike—and, this time, with a slow caution 
that proved that Urrea had profited by the lesson 
Fannin had taught. 

They were within six hundred yards now. The 
brass field pieces whirled into position, took their 
powder and belched grey-black smoke. Tense as they 
were, Fannin’s men raised a weak, derisive cheer 
when the projectiles passed high overhead, throwing 



CAPITULATION 


45 


the Mexican line on the opposite side into temporary 
confusion. 

“Let ’em alone an’ they’ll lick themselves,” said 
a messmate at Duval’s elbow, laughing in a queer, 
cackling way. Duval tried to join in the laugh, but 
his parched lips and throat made but a hideous, 
shuddering sound. 

The guns out there roared again, spitting grape 
and cannister. Too high again. Another feeble cheer 
was the only answer. The volunteers’ guns must be 
served only in dire extremity. No water for the 
swabbing of them. Not enough big gun ammunition 
for a real duel. The boys with the long, brass- 
trimmed rifles must do the greater part of the work. 

“Eyes open, boys! They’re coming!” Passing 
along his front, the stump of his shattered finger 
wrapped in a soiled handkerchief, his rugged face 
grey with pain and thirst and fatigue, their Captain 
still was every inch a man and a commander. 

Trumpets sounded over by the timber. The coil 
of dragoons tightened a little. The infantry opened 
a gap through which the artillery rumbled to a nearer 
station. From a kaleidoscopic spectacle of color and 
action, the enemy became fixed in that supreme 
tension that precedes sanguinary attack. 

The trumpets again, this time blaring out a short 
call that had no meaning to the Texan listeners. 

What’s this? The Mexican lines appeared to relax 
and stand at ease. Riding slowly to the front, a 
mounted man carried a white flag on a staff, waving 


46 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


it with a frantic energy that raised another ghastly 
laugh among the volunteers. 

“That hombre shore wants us to see what he’s 
carryin’,” Duval’s mate said, jerkily. “They’s a 
officer a-follerin’ of ’im, too.” 

“Wanting a parley, I reckon,” the Captain put 
in, then stooped to chuck a pebble into his mouth to 
assuage his thirst. 

“You mean this thing may be stopped, and we 
can get water for the boys that are wounded,” Duval 
asked, wistfully. 

“Yeh—if the terms are right. If they’re wrong, 
we’ll fight ’em to a finish, damn ’em.” 

Eyeing the messengers closely, the Captain sat 
down cross-legged and commenced rearranging the 
bloody bandage on his maimed hand. He spat out 
the pebble and grinned crookedly when Duval 
offered his precious remaining twist of natural leaf. 
“One thing about Fannin,” he mumbled past the 
tobacco at which he was gnawing. “You never have 
to guess what he’ll do. It’ll be fight, fight, fight, 
unless that greaser talks plain, and talks right.” 

A look at the Colonel who chanced to be passing 
convinced Duval that the Captain was right. Fannin’s 
whole attitude as he looked his massed antagonists 
over casually was as if he were saying: “Well, I’ll 
talk terms, if you insist. But, remember this: I licked 
you yesterday, and I can do it again today. That 
being agreed, we’ll parley, if you like ^ but I’m the 
fellow who will dictate the terms.” 


CAPITULATION 


47 


Headed by Major Wallace, commander of the 
Lafayette battalion, a small group of officers went 
to meet the messenger. After parleying for a few 
minutes, they returned to report that Urrea had 
taken the position that the volunteers were com¬ 
pletely within his power. Wishing to avoid useless 
bloodshed, he was offering Fannin an opportunity 
to surrender at discretion . 

“Like I told you,” Duval’s Captain said, rejoining 
his company after the Colonel’s answer had been sent 
back. “Old Fannin told ’em that he’d fight to the 
last grain of powder before he’d surrender on any 
such terms. 

“We’d just as well get ready for the big show to 
open.” 

Again that circle of dragoons constricted slightly 
and the enemy cannon moved nearer. Wearily the 
volunteers went to their stations. If only they had 
water- 

That short bugle call again. The man with the 
white flag again came to their front, a group of 
officers following him. Word passed among the men 
that one of them was Urrea. This time Fannin 
accompanied the officers who went out a little way 
to meet them. After a short discussion, they came 
inside the square, where the details of the capitula¬ 
tion were agreed upon. Fannin and his men were 
to be held as prisoners of war until exchanged, or 
liberated upon their parole not to engage in the 
remainder of the war—this at the option of the 
Mexican Commander-in-Chief. This agreement was 


48 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


reduced to writing by Urrea’s secretary, and the 
English translation of it read to the men. (18) 

In the main, the battle-weary men accepted the 
arrangement cheerfully enough, though, like many 
others, Duval experienced a real pang of regret 
when the time came for him to cast his pet rifle into 
the heap that was forming outside the breastwork. 
Here and there a man muttered protest. One 
mutinous fellow threw a lighted cigar into the re¬ 
serve supply of powder, two of his comrades being 
killed by the resulting explosion. 

But conditions had argued powerfully in support 
of Urrea’s apparently fair proposal. It offered water, 
food of a sort, transportation for their wounded, and 
opportunity for them to be treated. Then, too, per¬ 
haps the volunteers from the states considered their 
duty fully performed—that they had done more 
than enough for a Texas that had done nothing 
whatever for them. Good old Fannin had not asked 
to be the boss 5 but he had been given the command, 
and had been promised full support. (19) But the 
colonists had not come to La Bahia, or even sent 
needed supplies there. 

All right, then. Let ’em fight it out, themselves. 
After all, it was their country. If they were willing 
to accept the situation, why should the sons of 
Kentucky and Alabama and Georgia and Tennessee 
trouble themselves further? 

Back toward dismantled Defiance marched the 
volunteers. Passing through Goliad, they were jeered 


CAPITULATION 


49 


and spat upon by the very people who formerly had 
posed as their friends. Rubio, a fat, and seemingly 
good-natured fellow in whose stuffy little cantina 
Duval often had enjoyed a drink and a chat, came 
to the entrance as they filed past. Spotting Duval, 
he bellowed a coarse taunt at him, then drew his 
finger suggestively across his greasy throat. Vindic¬ 
tive Goliad had shed its sheep’s clothing. 

A little way on along the narrow white street, 
there were bits of compensating friendliness. Old 
Donna Monez, in whose garden Duval had enjoyed 
many a quiet afternoon, drinking white wine and 
trading English lessons for Spanish, parted her 
curtains to wave a furtive greeting. On the next 
corner, her long black lashes dewed with tears, little 
Rosita Garcia, with whom he had flirted innocently, 
blew a kiss across her fingertips, then muffled her 
face in her mantilla and turned quickly away. (20) 
The big gringo bravo still was her god, but she must 
worship him in secret. 

Heartened, Duval trudged on with the others. 
Some day, when he had become a ranger, he would 
come back to Goliad to slap Rubio’s fat face and sip 
the Donna’s wine and hear Rosita’s liquid laugh. 

Again within the walls surrounding the mossy old 
mission, the volunteers relieved themselves of their 
accoutrements and threw themselves upon the 
ground, to sleep soundly for the first time since they 
had left the place. 

So far as they were concerned, the war was over. 


50 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


They had the signed and sealed capitulation, and 
Urrea’s word of honor as a gentleman and a soldier 
that its provisions would be carried out. 

Onerous confinement, the sense of degradation 
that accompanies imprisonment, they must accept 
philosophically for a time. Pretty tough, but it prob¬ 
ably wouldn’t last long. The boys back home would 
come with a rush when they heard of the Mexican 
successes. The twenty thousand colonists then in 
Texas would assemble and make their power felt. 
They were temporarily inconvenienced, but their 
time to cheer would come, soon. 

Later, when a dog’s ration of uncooked beef 
became their regular fare, and they were crowded 
within the mission with scarcely room to lie down, 
and denied even the privilege of keeping their 
weakened bodies clean, their confidence in Urrea’s 
fair promises weakened to an extent. 

The remnant of Ward’s battalion joined Fannin’s 
men as prisoners. Eighty men who had landed at 
Copano to find that port in Mexican hands were 
surrendered by their commander, Major Miller, and 
brought to Goliad. They had dumped their arms into 
the bay and passed themselves off as peaceful 
colonists. (21) 

Again nearly five hundred men were assembled at 
La Bahia. As before, they looked forward to the 
ultimate invasion of Mexico—but, this time, their 
expected role was that of idle, though not disinter¬ 
ested, onlookers. 


CAPITULATION 


SI 


Blame the luck! It would be hard to lie penned, 
while the other boys turned the trick. But, after all, 
war is war. The thing couldn’t last always, and there 
was a rumor that an exchange of prisoners was being 
arranged. 


Chapter VII 


A HALF MINUTE 

“Fall in line, you Mustangs .” 

The orderly sergeant’s voice quavered with excite¬ 
ment as he called the order, and his face, stubbly 
with the beard he had been unable to remove during 
their confinement, lighted with a joyous smile as he 
added: “Git a hustle on. We’re goin’ home!” 

“Home!” A hundred voices echoed the magic 
word as the men snapped out of the hopeless indo¬ 
lence that had held them and crowded around him, 
yammering out jumbled inquiries. 

“Home,” the sergeant repeated. “Now hush that 
yappin’ an’ git lined up. We’re goin’ to be shipped 
to N’Orleans, right away.” 

Rising from a filthy corner where he had been 
dozing, Duval bundled his few remaining properties 
into his haversack, and exchanged light banter with 
his messmates. All over the gloomy old building 
now, men were running to and fro, their non-com¬ 
missioned officers shouting instructions and endeavor¬ 
ing to bring them into orderly array. As Duval 
packed the last of his duffle, an acquaintance who 
belonged to Miller’s command stopped near by. 

52 


A HALF MINUTE 


53 


“Why ain’t you packing?” Duval asked, casting 
aside a pair of socks that had outworn their use¬ 
fulness. 

“We ain’t goin’,” the other answered, dolefully. 

“Why?” Duval asked, in surprise. 

“Dunno.” The man glanced at the white cloth 
tied about his sleeve to identify him as one of 
Miller’s men. “I got a durn good notion to rip that 
off an’ fall in with you fellers. Dawgone, but you’re 
lucky!” 

“I wouldn’t do it,” Duval advised. “You’ll be 
coming within a few days, anyway. They’re probably 
leaving you behind because you got here later than 
we did 5 maybe they’re going to ship you on a differ¬ 
ent boat. A day or two more won’t-” 

“Hey, Duval,” the sergeant yelled. “Get a wiggle 
on you. Your squad’s all ready but you!” Milling 
and jostling for elbow room, the various companies 
of Fannin’s original force, including the survivors 
of Ward’s command, brought a semblance of order 
into their ranks, and obeyed with alacrity when a 
number of Mexican officers moved about among 
them, separating the companies into three divisions 
of approximately a hundred and fifty men each. The 
section to which the Mustangs were attached marked 
time impatiently while the two other divisions 
marched out, and away. Even the few minutes they 
waited seemed hours, so eager were they to leave 
the foul air of their dank, gloomy prison and be on 
the march. 



54 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


It was Palm Sunday, March 27, 1836 —a day and 
a date written large in the history of one country; 
a day and date another country never shall be 
allowed to forget; a day and date that Duval hastily 
scribbled into his diary while the Mustangs awaited 
orders. 

Home! The single word suffices to depict their 
feelings as they filed out through the mossy arch¬ 
way, passing between double rows of Mexican 
infantrymen who caught step with them and con¬ 
voyed them toward the river. 

“They sure believe in taking good care of us,” 
Duval said to Corporal Hawkins, marching on his 
left. “We have, anyway, two armed guards to every 
man of us.” 

“Yeh. An 5 I seen a big bunch of cavalry go on 
ahead, a little while ago,” Hawkins answered. “Well, 
after all, this Urrea ’pears to be a right good feller. 
He promised to see us safe on our way, an’ by jinks, 
he’s doin’ it. 

“By th’ way, you understand Spanish. Them 
women back there by the fort called us pobrechos 
when we come out. What does that mean?” 

“It means ‘poor fellows’,” Duval answered. “I 
suppose the looks of us made them say it. We’re 
a pretty boney crowd, right now.” 

“Wait till I’m back in old Kaintuck with my feet 
under Maw’s table. She’ll hafta sweep aroun’ ’em 
fur th’ first week,” Hawkins grinned. “Honest t’ 
Gawd, when I think of real home-cured bacon an’ 
aigs an’ ’taters, I-” 



A HALF MINUTE 


55 


“Hey! They’re headin’ us inta th’ San Antonio 
road. Copano ain’t that-a-way!” 

“You’re right,” Duval agreed, puzzled, but not 
at all uneasy. “A fellow in Wards bunch told me the 
Mexicans said we were going to get some beef. Looks 
like he knew what he was talking about. Probably 
we’ll get our meat, then turn back and follow the 
others.” 

“Reckon you’re right. Like as not, that’s why 
them cavalrymen went on ahead. They’re gonna 
round up th’ cattle an’ have ’em ready. I shore hope 
they git a plenty whilst they’re at it. I cud eat a hull 
cow myself, right now, an’-” 

“Halt!” 

The command was delivered in English, by a little 
Mexican officer who passed along the line, instructing 
the prisoners to remove their packs and stand at ease. 
At the same time, the double rank of guards on the 
river side passed through their lines and reformed, 
facing them. After this rearrangement, the open 
prairie and the guards were on one side of them, 
a little way off on the other side was the river. 
“Here’s where we get that beef,” Duval thought, 
as he loosened the strap of his haversack and looked 
expectantly toward a timbered spot ahead where 
a force of dragoons was emerging. Seconds later, 
he had straightened and stiffened to attention, fairly 
overpowered by a great suspicion that had filled him 
suddenly. And, almost with that sickening idea, came 
the realization of it. 



56 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


Musketry had sounded over by the lower ford, 
where one division had gone. A moment later, 
a volley rumbled somewhere on the San Patricio 
road, which the second section had taken. Somewhere 
near the head of the little column of startled men 
a shrill, strained voice rose: “Boys, they’re going 
to shoot us!” 

All along the length of the line gunlocks clicked 
as the guards backed off a few paces and leveled 
their muskets. Somebody barked an order. Flame 
leaped from the muzzles of the heavily-charged 
escopetas . The line of men in the roadway withered, 
crumpled, became an irregular windrow of still 
forms, with here and there a wounded man writhing 
in agony. Into the welter charged the guards, 
jabbing, clubbing, hacking with their daggers. Out 
of the reek, a few grim-faced men raced desperately 
for the river, pursued by such of their assassins as 
were not engaged in slaughtering the wounded. (22) 

Closing in from three directions, the dragoons 
raced to be in at the death. A-steam with bloodlust, 
the entire Mexican line charged across that crimson- 
puddled road and on to the river bank. Stragglers, 
some of them wounded, fell between the road and 
the river as the bayonets did their deadly work. A 
pitifully few Texans splashed into the river, and 
some of the soldiers reloaded hastily and fired at 
their bobbing heads, while the cavalry galloped off 
to cross at the ford and run them down. 

Nowhere in that gore-splashed river-bend was 
exhibited a mote of soldierly chivalry, a spark of 


A HALF MINUTE 


57 


human compassion, a faint gleam of that respect 
which even crude savagery pays to the condemned, 
everywhere was the zeal of the huntsman—the killer 
instinct unleashed for the historic half-minute that 
caused Mexican dominance over any square foot of 
Texas soil to become forever impossible. 

What of Duval? 

He had turned to look toward the San Patricio 
road when the gunfire sounded there. Warned by 
the clicking musket-locks, he faced about just as the 
fatal volley was fired. Instinctively, Duval threw 
himself, face downward, on the hard road. Sprawling 
down, the body of poor Hawkins fell across him, 
and, weakened as he was by the privations of Coleto 
and lack of food while imprisoned, Duval freed 
himself only after the Mexican line had charged 
across the row of bodies. Rising with an effort, he 
looked about him. At first glance, the prairie looked 
inviting, as not an enemy remained on it. The Mex¬ 
ican foot soldiers were plunging toward the river. 
The cavalry was edging in on either flank. 

But, not a moment’s thought was needed to con¬ 
vince him that escape over the open was out of the 
question. Swarming with enemies, the river way 
looked almost as bad, but there was a chance—the 
only chance, and that a slim one. 

There ensued a strange spectacle. Fleeing Texans 
pursued by their enemies, and behind those enemies 
another Texan keeping pace with them; still back, 
dragoons pounding after him. To reach the river, 


58 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


Duval must pass through the Mexican line; he must 
not pass through it too soon, or he would become its 
nearest target. 

It was all a matter of seconds. When the man- 
hunters neared the river bank, Duval made a des¬ 
perate spurt, and gained on them. A little to his left, 
the human barrier appeared thinner than elsewhere. 
Swerving in that direction, he was running breast 
to breast with them, and only a few yards from the 
water, when one of them saw him, and lunged 
viciously, his gleaming bayonet aimed for Duval’s 
abdomen. Exhausted, and now hopeless, Duval was 
making but a half-hearted effort to avoid the thrust, 
when another fugitive running a little way ahead, 
faltered and reeled between them, receiving the full 
force of the blow. 

Thrown out of his stride, Duval lost a little head¬ 
way, but recovered readily and plunged on. As he 
passed them, he saw the solder put his foot on the 
prostrate Texan’s body to make an ineffectual effort 
to withdraw the bayonet. 

The water was just ahead now, and barring the 
way to it were the soldiers, who, however, had their 
backs to him. Behind him, the clatter of sword-gear 
and pound of hooves told that the dragoons were 
almost within striking distance. Gathering all his 
strength, Duval rammed through the infantry, 
caught his breath and dove headlong into the swift 
current. 

Always a good swimmer, Duval made fair head- 


A HALF MINUTE 


59 


way, weakened though he was. All about him, slugs 
splashed, the firing growing heavier as more and 
more of his enemies got their pieces reloaded. Twice 
he dove, staying under until his lungs appeared about 
to burst and his head sank and the far shore grew 
hazy and seemed to be more and more distant when 
he rose and bore doggedly on. 

Then suddenly, he was at the bank—a sheer wall 
of clay that offered no hand-hold. 

Ah, a dangling vine, where the bank inclined 
a little. It was a little upstream, but Duval inched 
toilsomely toward it. Gripping the fragile green 
cable, he put his remaining strength into a mighty 
effort that lifted his numbed body half out of the 
water. Just then, a missile from the opposite shore 
cut the vine close to his hand, the Mexicans cheering 
exultingly as he dropped back into the swirling water 
—too spent to battle further. 

Call it blind luck, fate, Providence—what you 
will—whatever force was ruling DuvaPs destiny 
had full sway. He had given every atom of his force, 
and could only float helplessly, too far gone to 
worry about the outcome. After a time, he became 
conscious that he was being turned slowly about in 
a lazy eddy. Then something brushed his shoulder 
and he clutched it feebly and relaxed, allowing his 
body to come to rest on a shelving bank where an 
over-hanging tree sheltered him from observation. 

Minutes passed. The clamor on the far bank sub¬ 
sided. Alternately struggling and resting, Duval 
worked his body out of the water and bellied up 


60 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


a brush-clad slope and into the shelter of the timber. 

Duval was tired—desperately tired. But he was 
young and life was sweet. Between him and those 
who had sought his life so relentlessly was but 
a narrow strip of water, which he knew the dragoons 
must have forded, already. It was spur enough. 
Rising, he staggered across a little glade and reached 
the edge of the belt of timber. Beyond was bare, 
brown prairie. As he was about to step into the open, 
he glanced to his left. Sitting their horses like so 
many eager hounds at the mouth of a rabbit warren, 
a body of Mexican lancers were watching the timber 
expectantly. Subtle Urrea had left nothing undone 
that would safeguard his reputation for utter ruth¬ 
lessness. 

Wearily Duval turned back to the little glade 
where he sat down and pondered over what might 
be his best course. 

Across the river, the Mexicans had completed 
their gruesome butchery and were stripping the dead 
of their valuables—even their serviceable clothing. 
A detail already had commenced piling the bodies 
for incineration. Two or three small squads were 
preparing to cross and beat the timber in the expect¬ 
ancy that a little more human game might be flushed 
before their guns. 

The end appeared inevitable; all Duval could 
do was to wait it out. Waiting, he thought of many 
persons and many things—of the little cabin back in 
Kentucky where poor Hawkins had thought of 


A HALF MINUTE 


61 


putting his feet under “Maw’s” table and letting 
“Maw” sweep around them for a week while he ate 
home-cured bacon and eggs and potatoes. 

He thought of the Mexican women who, knowing 
their fate, had called them pobrecitos; of Miller’s 
man cursing the white band on his sleeve which was 
his salvation, and of the little lieutenant who would 
have saved him by making a good Catholic of him. 

And he thought of good old Fannin, and knew 
how right Fannin had been when he preferred fight¬ 
ing to surrender. (23) As riflemen, these Mexicans 
were a sorry lot, not even capable of doing a clean, 
workmanlike job of butchering the defenceless. 
Opposed by men of that stripe, Fannin might have 
remained at Defiance, indefinitely. At least, had his 
wishes prevailed, his men could have died gloriously 
there, or at Coleto. Also (he grated his teeth over 
the thought) they could have taken a few hundred 
of the enemy with them. 

The day wore on. Occasionally, a burst of 
musketry told that some harried skulker had been 
sighted and the hunt was on. Out on the prairie, the 
lancers waited, hawklike, and vulturelike. Eyeing 
them morosely, Duval thought of his own ambition 
to become a ranger, and wondered what a ranger 
would do, in his predicament. With that thought, he 
braced himself and rose. 

The thing looked impossible, but he had to out¬ 
smart those ghouls, some way. 


Chapter VIII 


“SOLDIERS THREE” 

There was a commotion on the near bank of the 
river, and down stream. A musket was discharged, 
and Duval heard men calling to one another in Span¬ 
ish. Drawing himself into the fork of a low-growing 
oak, he saw that a number of Mexicans had crossed 
and were beating the brush a little way below where 
he had left the water. They were covering the 
ground thoroughly as they worked their way slowly 
up the stream. Knowing that they had seen him 
leave the river, he suspected that he was their quarry j 
but, after a little time, there was a scattered volley, 
followed by a chorus of exultant shouts. 

Some other poor, harried fellow had been driven 
from cover and slaughtered. 

The noise down stream subsided, and Duval could 
imagine them stripping their prey. When some¬ 
thing chugged heavily into the river, he knew it was 
the body. 

Still the huntsmen worked nearer, quartering the 
strip of wood like so many eager hounds nosing for 
the scent. Duval slid to the ground and worked his 
62 


SOLDIERS THREE 


63 


way cautiously upstream till the timber thinned and 
he could go no further in that direction without com¬ 
ing into view of the vigilant lancers. Some bushes 
by the bank offered the best cover available and he 
lay down there, having decided to take to the water 
again, when the beaters came near. 

Desperate, seemingly marked for the killing, the 
hunted youth had to steel himself resolutely against 
a wild inclination to rise and make a race for it—a 
race that could have but one end. The reasoning 
power that enabled him to withstand that impulse 
searched in vain for a more promising alternative. 
Once, he considered recrossing the river, on the 
theory that the pursuers would expect him to do 
anything but that. Finally he based all his hope 
upon a shallow gully that headed near where the 
lancers were stationed, and ran diagonally across 
the prairie toward where he knew another body of 
timber lay. It was a mere drain, dry at the time; but 
it was fringed with low bushes sufficient to cover the 
movements of a stooped man. If he only could get 
past those lynx-eyed lancers- 

But, the thing was impossible. The dragoons must 
move before the hunt reached him, or- 

Dried leaves rustled in a near-by swale. A stick 
cracking sharply under a man’s weight almost sent 
Duval into flight as the gong starts a race-horse, so 
taut were his nerves. Flattening himself, he peered 
beneath the bushes, and again had to summon all his 
will power to suppress the cry of relief that almost 




64- 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


escaped him. For, passing at an angle that would 
take him into the very arms of the lancers, was John 
Holliday, one of Duval’s own messmates. He was 
much older than Duval, and ordinarily, of impres¬ 
sive physique. Now, he appeared shrunken and a 
most abject figure, as he stole furtively through 
the brush, his clothing sodden with mud, his hag¬ 
gard face half hidden by the long hair that once 
had been his pride but now was bedraggled and 
dripping. As Duval watched anxiously, Holliday 
paused a moment to listen for sounds of pursuit, 
then stalked on—straight toward the certain death 
that awaited on the plain. 

Duval called softly, trying to gauge his shaking 
voice so that it might reach his friend, and not 
the enemy. When Holliday walked on, Duval called 
again and again, raising his voice a bit at each trial. 
Finally Holliday stopped and turned, evidently sus¬ 
pecting that he had heard something, but not cer¬ 
tain of it. His heart thumping against his ribs, Duval 
took off his fur cap and waved it above the bushes, 
knowing that Holliday would recognize it instantly 
as the property of a fellow Mustang. 

Holliday saw, and there was another trying time 
when he started to walk straight across the open 
glade that lay between him and Duval—which would 
cause him to be seen at once. Risking all on the 
chance that he would not be observed, Duval rose 
to his knees and motioned for Holliday to lie down. 
Obeying at once, the other lay still while Duval 
crept across the opening and joined him. 


SOLDIERS THREE 


65 


There was a silent hand-grip, then a whispered 
consultation which was interrupted after a minute 
when the leaves in the swale rustled again, and a 
soldier Duval knew as Brown (24) emerged and 
came straight to where they lay. He had just swum 
the river, having somehow managed to remain hid¬ 
den on the other side until the killers had finished 
their search there. 

The three consulted, nervously, while the beaters 
came nearer and nearer, and, coordinating with them, 
the lancers deployed and waited for their game. 
When the foot soldiers had approached to within 
three hundred yards, Holliday could stand the strain 
of inactivity no longer. He proposed a dash across 
the prairie, and was arguing strenuously in support 
of that foolhardy move, when a diversion occurred. 

Somewhere across the swale, five Americans broke 
cover and raced for the prairie. Before the fleetest of 
them had gone a hundred yards, all of them were 
down. Dismounting, the cavalrymen looted the 
pockets of the dead, after beating and hacking the 
life out of the wounded. That work finished, they 
remounted and galloped around a little turn of the 
wood, probably to carry the joyful news to the foot 
soldiers. 

“Come on,” Duval called to his mates, then rose 
and broke for the little gully. He did not look back 
to see how far the troopers had gone, or whether 
or not they were faced the other way. It was the 
opportunity for which he had waited when Nature 


66 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


had repeatedly prompted him to flee. It was the 
only chance, and he took it, the others following, 
because nothing else remained to be done. 

It cannot be said that the three men ran. Actual 
running was beyond their waning strength. They did 
stagger along, their arms locked, poor, exhausted 
Brown lagging a little, despite his game efforts. 

And they made it. After dropping among the 
bushes, Holliday again was for flight when the 
dragoons came galloping back. “Lie still,” Duval 
cautioned, knowing that the cover was insufficient 
when their enemies were so near. 

“But they’ll be searching this place in another 
minute,” Holliday protested. 

“I think not,” Duval disagreed. “Now, hush and 
don’t move a muscle. They’ll pass near us, but they’ll 
pass.” Again, he was banking on the unexpected. 
He had seen those dragoons search that gully once, 
so they would assume it to be empty of game. 

They did pass, and so close that Duval could 
have thumbed a pebble on the nearest of them. The 
three could not have escaped observation, had the 
Mexicans not been intent upon regaining their for¬ 
mer position. 

The hide-and-seek game was renewed. Watching 
until certain that the dragoons were looking another 
way, Duval would steal from bush to bush, the 
others following. Then there would be another wait. 
Thus, crawling and halting, they covered a tedious 
furlong, after which the drain deepened, and the 
brush thickened, affording better cover. Twice dur- 


SOLDIERS THREE 


67 


ing the next hour, they narrowly escaped capture 
when other bodies of cavalry scouted the drain; 
but each time they were warned in season, and lay 
quiet until the danger had passed. After traveling 
for more than five miles, they finally dropped, 
utterly exhausted, in a thick grove, where they held 
another council and decided to wait where they 
were until nightfall. 

Throughout the long day they lay inactive, their 
ears tortured by the irregular volleys of distant mus¬ 
ketry which told that other survivors had been 
marked down. At nightfall, they filed away over the 
open prairie, keeping to the northeast on a course 
that skirted the tragic Coleto battlefield. The three 
walked silently, their numbed limbs yielding me¬ 
chanical obedience to their wills. Hours and miles 
passed uncounted. Plan they had none. The only 
thought in their minds was that they must keep 
going away from Goliad. At daylight they lurched 
into another island of timber and stopped there when 
Brown declared that he could go no further. 

Brown had removed his coat and shoes before 
plunging into the river, and his feet were pitifully 
swollen and lacerated. Though he begged the others 
to leave him and go on, Duval and Holliday heaved 
him to his feet and half carried him as they resumed 
the trek. After another hour, he appeared past all 
suffering, and marched stoically across the plain until 
sunset, when they camped in another timbered spot. 

The three now might have been said to have en- 


68 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


tered the second phase of their flight. Although, 
walking in the darkness with no stars to guide them, 
they had been unable to keep to any definite line of 
flight, they believed that they were beyond immedi¬ 
ate danger from the troops at Goliad. Their problem 
now was to evade contact with stray bands of Indians 
known to infest the region, and keep hidden from 
the Mexican scouts and guerrillas who would swarm 
over the conquered territory. 

It now had been two full days since their last 
ration—five ounces of half-cooked beef per man— 
had been eaten. Driven by a cutting wind, a cold 
drizzle of rain had come with the dusk. Though 
up to now, they had not dared risk a fire, Duval 
decided that one must be started at all hazards. 
It might betray them to some roving band of the 
enemy j but, without it, they certainly could not 
hope to survive the night. 

In DuvaPs pocket was a little flat box which had 
kept his flint and steel dry. Along with them was a 
mere morsel of tinder scarcely larger than a pin¬ 
head. With the others watching apprehensively, he 
removed a bit of cotton from the lining of his fur 
cap and placed the little ball of tinder on it. Spark 
after spark failed, but finally it caught and a feeble 
flame crept through the cotton, drying and light¬ 
ing the damp dead twigs he patiently added from 
time to time. While Holliday dragged in more fuel, 
Duval tore a strip from his underwear, half burned 
it and packed it into the little box as their future 
store of tinder. 


SOLDIERS THREE 


69 


Gradually they built up a fire that a little more 
than offset the misty rain, and brought warmth to 
their famished bodies. Through the night. Brown lay 
in a semi-stupor, while his two mates took turns at 
keeping watch and replenishing the fire. Never, even 
when facing those guns on the river road, had they 
been nearer death; a morsel of scorched fabric had 
been the arbiter of their destiny. 

With the coming of the morning, the rain stopped, 
and a kindly sun bathed them with its cheering rays. 
Though dreadfully sleepy now that they were warm, 
they knew that they must go on, and find food, some¬ 
how. First, though, something must be done about 
Brown’s feet. 

As the Mexicans had taken even their jackknives 
away from them, they were without tools, except for 
a small pair of scissors Brown had somehow managed 
to keep. With these, Duval cut the tops of his own 
boots and fashioned a pair of sandals. First wrap- 
ing Brown’s raw soles in strips torn from their 
clothing, he and Holliday laced the sandals on him 
and assisted him to his feet. Though every step must 
have been an excruciating torture, the game fellow 
minced along with never a word of complaint, when 
the three filed wearily from their little haven and 
took to the prairie. 

An hour brought them to what Duval thought he 
recognized as a branch of Coleto Creek. Just after 
they had crossed, a body of Mexican lancers ap¬ 
peared, stopping within fifty yards of where they 


70 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


lay, partially concealed in the grass. Another soldier 
who probably was a scout, met the troopers and 
conversed with them for a time, then all rode away, 
and, once more, the three escaped death by the 
narrowest of margins. 

Throughout that day one hour was like another, 
except that the skies again became over-clouded, and 
light showers fell intermittently. After another night 
of fitful slumber in a grove, the performance of the 
day before was repeated. It was just walk, walk, 
walk—with each step taken an infinitesimal fraction 
of an inch shorter than the one preceding it. Starva¬ 
tion was steadily taking its toll. To make the pangs 
of hunger more maddening, fat birds burst from 
every covert and big game showed everywhere. It 
being the oflF season of the year, not a tree or bush 
bore a fruit or a nut. The very grass beneath their 
feet appeared to mock them with its sere life¬ 
lessness. 

Up to now, because he was older than the others, 
Holliday had assumed leadership, selecting their 
campsites and guiding their route. Though naturally 
diffident, Duval had confidence in his own woods- 
manship and instinctive knowledge of direction— 
“hawg-sense” as they called it, in Kentucky. He had 
been reared in the forests and on the grassy hills, 
while Holliday was city-bred. Consequently, when 
Duval became convinced that they were heading in 
the wrong direction, he entered a protest which 
Holliday overruled, somewhat brusquely. Though 


SOLDIERS THREE 


71 


convinced that he was right, Duval let the matter 
rest for a time. Later when he thought he recog¬ 
nized Manahuila Creek—the same they had crossed 
when leaving Goliad with Fannin—he called Holli¬ 
day’s attention to it. 

“You’re dreaming,” was Holliday’s answer as he 
took to the shallow water and went splashing across. 
“All these creeks look alike, and you only think 
you know this one.” 

The three pegged on, Duval more worried than 
the others because he still was suspicious that they 
were following the wrong course. It was nearly 
sunset when he balked definitely after they had 
entered a live-oak grove that he was almost cer¬ 
tain he had covered when out hunting. “Go on if 
you like,” he said to Holliday. “I won’t take another 
step till I know where we’re headed for.” 

“Don’t worry, we’re all right,” Holliday answered, 
trying to speak confidently, though it could be seen 
that he had grown uneasy, for the first time. He 
thought for a moment, then nodded toward Brown, 
who had slumped down by the boll of a tree, too 
near lifeless to join in the argument. “He needs a 
rest, anyway. Stay here with him, whilst I go scout 
a little.” 

Within an hour, Holliday stalked into sight, the 
very droop of his shoulders announcing the verdict. 
He had been within sight of Goliad, and had heard 
the drums and bugles at the fort. Three days of 
hellish torture on the trail had brought them back 


72 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


almost to the scene of the massacre, and within reach 
of Urrea’s relentless arm. It was a staggering blow, 
but lamentations would avail nothing. The three hol¬ 
low-eyed, haggard-faced men reversed their course, 
recrossed the creek and threw themselves on a bed 
of leaves to fall into the stupor that comes with 
extreme fatigue—too far gone to worry greatly about 
what the outcome might be. 

One thing, and one thing only had been accom¬ 
plished. After again going wrong in their short 
march back to the creek, and after Duval had 
warned that if he went as he was going, he would go 
alone—and after Brown had backed Duval—Holli¬ 
day had relinquished the leadership, saying, “I’d 
rather go wrong then be alone.” 

At the outset, their chance of escape had been 
slim; now it appeared almost negligible. But, from 
now on out, every painful tottering step would be 
made to count. 


Chapter IX 


NATURE IS HOSTILE 

Grey dawn found the three again on their way. A 
few hours later, something occurred which might 
ordinarily have been considered a trivial incident, but 
which assumes importance as an event when con¬ 
sidered in connection with two facts. 

It saved their lives, once more. 

And it proved to Duval that John Holliday was 
a man. 

They had covered five or six miles, and Duval 
was taking his turn in the lead, regulating his pace 
to that of Brown, who now could go no more than 
two or three hundred yards before stopping to rest. 
Bringing up the rear, Holliday kept his eye on 
Brown, helping him at times. 

Perhaps fifty yards in the lead, Duval looked back 
to see how the others were faring. As he did so, he 
saw Holliday weave out of the trail and stoop so 
quickly that Duval knew that he had made a find 
of some sort. It was a little moist spot by a willow 
thicket, with no bushes of any sort near. 

When Holliday straightened, he was clutching 
something in his hand. Again he stooped and straight- 
73 


74- 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


enedj then, after circling the little oasis with his eyes 
on the ground, he tucked whatever was in his hand 
into his pocket and came on. 

Not once did Duval take his eyes off Holliday till 
they had stopped to rest, some hours later. Then, 
with the air of a butler uncovering a juicy roast 
garnished with asparagus and bedecked with mush¬ 
rooms, Holliday reached into his pocket and drew 
out- 

Just a handful of little wild onions. 

Puckering his thin lips, Holliday whistled a wav¬ 
ering imitation of the mess call as he divided the 
dozen shriveled bulbs into three equal parts. After 
an inquiring look at Duval, he cut down two of the 
portions, adding what he had taken from them to 
the bunch he passed to Brown. “Eat ’em,” he said, 
gruffly. “I think our luck is turning.” 

Just some raw onions—which Holliday could have 
devoured at a gulp, saying nothing to the others. 

“Eat ’em, fellers.” 

Persons whose only knowledge of hunger has been 
when their dinners were not ready on the minute 
may not know how those three words measured a 
man, and sealed one of those friendships that last 
through time and eternity. 

Their luck did appear to be on the mend, so far as 
food was concerned j for, next morning, Duval found 
a number of vegetables of the cactus family which 
he had heard called “Turk’s heads.” When mashed, 



NATURE IS HOSTILE 


75 


the pulp exudes a fair substitute for water, with some 
little food value. 

However, such mere tastes as they had secured 
only served to arouse excruciating pangs in stomachs 
that had been so long without food that they had 
ceased to call for it until a little provender had 
started them to functioning normally. That eve¬ 
ning, as they were about to go into camp on the 
banks of a river that Duval assumed to be the Guada- 
loupe, they saw a cow and her calf browsing by the 
stream. Having no weapons of any nature, they 
tried with what strength remained in their wasted 
bodies to force the cow, or at least the calf, over the 
river bank in the hope that it would drown, if not 
killed by the fall. Desperate though they were, their 
muscles simply were unequal to the task. Both ani¬ 
mals finally broke away from them, and they 
stumbled into a dry sinkhole a little way back from 
the river—so completely exhausted that not one of 
them expected to complete another day’s march. 

As Duval was falling asleep, his ears caught the 
tantalizing gobbling of wild turkeys as they went 
to roost in a near-by tree. How long he had slept 
he did not know when he was awakened from a 
dream of roast turkey with dressing by a light scram¬ 
bling sound among the leaves outside the swale. 
After a little time, the sound came nearer, and he 
knew that some animal was approaching the sink. 
As he rose to a sitting posture and grasped a billet 
of wood that lay near his pallet of leaves, a wild 


76 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


sow, followed by her young litter, came sliding dow 
the steep bank toward him. 

Followed a scene of commotion that would hav 
been ludicrous but for its tragic pathos. Roused b 
his cry, Holliday and Brown came to his aid as h 
attacked the sow with a succession of feeble blows 
Tottering on their shaking legs, the three gaun 
men staggered about the little basin, showering 
blows on the mother, without any other effect than t( 
cause her to rip Holliday’s calf when he lost hi| 
balance and fell against her. Retreating up the bank, 
the matron and her brood were about to escape, whetj 
Duval suddenly commenced to think clearly. “The 
pigs,” he yelled, lashing out at them with his club 
as they huddled against their retreating dam’s side] 
as she backed away fighting. 

The club thwacked home solidly, and a squealing 
black shape dropped threshing to the leaves. En¬ 
couraged, the three plunged in viciously, bringing 
down four more pigs. 

Food! Five battered little bodies, dressed hurriedly 
with the knife Duval had fashioned out of one of 
Brown’s scissorblades. The fire was rekindled hastily, 
and the meat cooked a little longer than was re¬ 
quired to singe off the hair. 

In flat disregard of what they had read in rela¬ 
tion to the proper dieting of a near-starved human, 
the three ate every ounce of the half-raw, half- 
scorched meat, picking the bones clean. Then they 



NATURE IS HOSTILE 


77 


burrowed in the leaves and slept soundly until the 
sun was two hours high. 

The morning task was to cross the river—a difficulty 
because the stream was swollen by recent rains, and 
had a swift and treacherous current. As Brown was 
the weakest, he was stripped, the burden of his cloth¬ 
ing being divided between the other two. Scarcely 
had Duval reached the far bank, when he heard 
Brown calling for aid, and turned back to him, push¬ 
ing a large slab he had found floating by the bank. 
Holliday coming to his assistance in the nick of time, 
the two got their helpless mate to the bank and out 
of the water. 

For two days the little party tramped northward 
and eastward, nothing of consequence occurring to 
vary the monotony of their tedious march. Twice 
they saw bodies of horsemen so distant that they 
could not tell whether they were Mexicans or In¬ 
dians. Once they sighted a small band of Indians, 
and took refuge in the tall grass of a swale until 
they had passed. They found no food of any kind, 
but crossed several small streams which kept off 
their other arch tormentor—thirst. 

On the evening of the third day since they had 
eaten, Duval was dragging in firewood for their 
foodless camp when he came upon a heap of leaves 
and twigs that aroused his curiosity. Laying down 
the wood he was carrying, he dug into the mysterious 
heap. 

Glory be! Food again—this time part of the car- 


78 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


cass of a deer that doubtless had been killed by a 
Mexican lion. Building a fire in record time, they 
soon had chunks of fat venison spitted on green 
twigs and roasting over the coals. 

Again they ate without stint, and again they slept 
soundly and rose rested and invigorated. After break¬ 
fasting on what little remained of the venison, they 
resumed their journey, stronger and in better spirits 
than they had been at any other time since they had 
left Goliad. 

By now, the three had commenced to take a more 
optimistic view of their situation. At first, they had 
taken to flight on the bare chance that they might 
escape, and with no real hope. But, as day succeeded 
day, and crisis after crisis was passed, their hopes 
rose. “Believe we’re going to make it,” Holliday 
confided, as they trudged across the bottom of what 
they knew must be the Lavaca, or Cow, river and 
came upon some clapboards and rails—the first sign 
of a settlement they had seen. “It just ain’t natural 
that fellers who has been through what we have 
should go under now that we’ve reached-” 

“S-h-h,” Duval cautioned. “Listen to that! There 
are hogs down there by the river, or I don’t know 
their grunt when I hear it. 

“How’d a pork supper strike you?” 

The pork was there, but they got no supper. After 
swimming the river, they came upon the hogs, but 
found them to be of the genuine razorback variety, 
wild as so many antelope, and almost as fleet. Still 
too weak to try chasing down even the suckling pigs, 



NATURE IS HOSTILE 


79 


they stalked them half-heartedly for a time, aban¬ 
doning that futile effort when something of far 
greater importance claimed their attention. For, as 
they were slipping cautiously toward a little strip of 
timber into which they thought the hog herd had 
vanished, they came upon ten picketed saddle horses. 
Back among the trees the smoke of an encampment 
spiraled lazily upward, and low voices could be 
heard, and the sound of an axe. Somewhere about 
the place, a dog set up an excited baying. 

Here was a fresh problem, and, with their lives 
at stake, they counciled long and earnestly. That 
could be the camp of a body of Mexican dragoons, 
and it could be that of Texas scouts. With the opti¬ 
mism characteristic of him, Holliday suggested that it 
might be Horton and his troopers. Another theory 
was that it was an advance party of Houston’s army, 
going into the west, at last. 

In the end it was decided to take no chances, but 
to lie close and see who came to get the horses, as 
they would soon, as night was coming on. That hav¬ 
ing been decided, Duval and Brown lay down in a 
clump of bushes, and Holliday ensconced himself in 
another, a little way off. No sooner had they done 
so, than they knew that they had made a mistake 
that had brought fresh danger upon them. For, 
probably warned by the incessant barking of the 
dog, a Mexican ranchero came out of the timber 
and, after noting that the horses were grazing un¬ 
molested, walked directly to where Duval and Brown 
lay. Seeing them, he scowled blackly and said in 


80 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


Spanish, “Hey, Americanos , what are you doing 
here?” When neither of them answered, he added, 
“Stealing our horses, eh?” 

When they still remained silent—Brown because 
he understood no Spanish and Duval because he 
wished to avoid answering questions—the ranchero 
looked them over closely, and, evidently satisfied 
that they had no arms, made signs for them to rise 
and follow him. As he led off toward camp, he passed 
within a few yards of Holliday, but did not discover 
him. 

The two men followed their captor peacefully 
enough, but Duval had no idea of going to the 
camp. Fighting being out of the question, in their 
weakened condition, nothing remained but an at¬ 
tempt to run. “We’ll split when we reach that spot 
where the path passes the point of timber,” he said 
to Brown. “Following that plan, one of us has a 
chance to get away, as he can’t chase both of us. 

“Watch me. When I break to the right, throw 
yourself into those bushes and crawl for it. Meet me 
at their camp tomorrow morning. They’ll be gone 
by then.” 

There was no time to say more. The ranchero 
still walked ahead, looking back frequently to see 
if they were following. They neared the brush. 
Bracing himself for the effort, Duval left the path 
and plunged into a thicket. As he did so, a quick 
side-glance told him that Brown was obeying orders. 

Much to Duval’s surprise the Mexican followed 


NATURE IS HOSTILE 


81 


ither of them. Instead, he broke for the camp, 
hich was now quite near, calling excitedly in 
panish: “Quick, men! Bring your guns! Here are 
lome Americanos!” 

It was late sunset when they started their dash, 
,nd the darkness came on, bringing with it pattering 
ain that Duval welcomed, as it might discourage 
mrsuit. Unable to really run, he threshed through 
he thicket and jogged across a succession of small 
'lades, slowing to a walk when the sounds of the 
base grew fainter behind him. After covering about 
, mile, he stumbled against a big tree that was 
oaded with long festoons of Spanish moss. Under 
hat canopy, he sank down upon a bed of leaves, 
dis strength was spent 5 his courage had ebbed. The 
noss thatched off the wet, and the leaves were soft 5 
he patter of the rain on the branches overhead 
night be a lullaby, or might be a requiem. If they 
ame and found him, he would neither fight nor 
lee. He had done what a man could 5 now he would 
est and sleep, be his time long or short. 

A note of menace crept into the croon of the 
orest wind. The chill rain filtered through the 
ranches, striking at his life with all of the cruel 
ersistence of his human foes. In the tree-top 
verhead, a great horned owl hooted wisely, de- 
isively, as though mocking the helplessness of the 
itruder upon his nocturnal domain. On the ridge 
cross the bottom, the wolf pack howled out their 
lournful hunger call. When they drew nearer 


82 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


and their cry became more clamorous, Duval was only 
mildly interested. The apathy that comes with ex¬ 
treme fatigue and hunger had wrapped him tightly. 
In his emaciated body there was not room for a 
fresh twinge of pain; no new terror could enter his 
harassed mind. He was alone and in the big, hostile 
world were but two friendly things—the moss and 
the leaves. 

Mattressed by the one and roofed by the other, 
he slept. 


Chapter X 


ALONE 

The sun was shining brightly when Duval awoke. 
Birds twittered and squirrels frisked among the 
interlocking branches, and the very rivulet that ran 
near by appeared to gurgle happily. His strength 
and spirits at low ebb, the lone fugitive responded 
gradually to Nature’s smiling mood. On such a 
morning, and in such a place one could not remain 
utterly despondent and indifferent to danger. By 
the time he had risen stiffly and walked a sufficient 
distance to start circulation in his thin and lagging 
blood-stream, hope had returned to him, in a meas¬ 
ure, and, with hope, a determination to battle on. 

The first thing to do, of course, was to contact his 
comrades, if possible. He was greatly worried about 
Brown. Even if he had escaped capture, Brown had 
little sense of direction. Duval’s chief fear was that 
his friend had run at random through the dark¬ 
ness, and never would find his way back to their 
rendezvous at the Mexican camp. 

As to Holliday, the prospect of a reunion with 
him was far more remote, as there had been no 
opportunity for them to agree upon a meeting place. 

83 


84 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


Putting himself in Holliday’s place, Duval could 
see easily that, having witnessed the capture of his 
companions, and being unable to succor them, he 
would leave the dangerous vicinity at once. How far 
he had gone, and in what direction could not even 
be guessed. As well try to locate a certain fish in the 
ocean as to attempt trailing down a lone man who 
had a twelve-hour start in that wilderness of thickets 
and glades. 

Knowing that nothing less than a miracle would 
put him in touch with Holliday, and that his chance 
of finding Brown was little less than fantastic, he 
nevertheless could try. In any event, and be the 
danger what it might, he would keep his part of the 
agreement. With that in view, he whipped his 
weakened limbs to their task and started back to¬ 
ward the neck of woods that held the Mexican camp. 
As he neared the spot, a thin column of smoke that 
formed a lazy funnel-like cloud above the timber 
almost caused him to turn and go the other way, con¬ 
vinced as he was, that, seeing it, Brown would do 
that very thing. In the end, though, he decided to 
go on. If either of them failed to keep that tryst, it 
would be Brown. 

Knowing well that the odds against his eventual 
escape were heavy, Duval had been reimbued with 
the spark that causes Man to fight to preserve his 
body. And with that, came caution, subtlety, the 
sagacity that enables a trained woodsman to live 
where a tyro would perish. For an hour he lay at the 


ALONE 


85 


edge of the wood before crossing the little open 
strip beyond which lay between the other wood and 
the encampment. Worn as he was, he circled the camp 
at a distance of a quarter of a mile in order to come 
up on it from down wind. When he did finally belly 
across the last opening and reach the fringe of bushes 
surrounding the fire, he waited there for another 
half-hour before showing himself. 

Empty! Just a few heaps of boughs where men 
had lain, a pile of unused faggots, a few eggshells. 

Labor lost? Unnecessary precaution? Yes, in this 
particular case. But he was following the look-and- 
listen rule of the frontiersman—the rule that, when 
observed consistently, spells the difference between 
safety and disaster. 

The first thing Duval did was to search the camn 
thoroughly for evidence that either of his friends 
had been detained there. Holliday wore boots much 
larger than any tracks that showed in the sandv 
soil. Brown’s peculiar sandals would have left a 
distinctive imprint, but no trace of that sort of track 
showed anywhere. Relieved on that point, Duval 
gathered up the eggshells and munched them greed¬ 
ily for the sake of the skins and the bits of white 
adhering, and for the additional reason that any 
reasonably acceptable thing brings a certain degree 
of comfort to an empty stomach. Perhaps half a 
spoonful of coffee grounds had stuck to a charred 
billet of wood, and he scraped them off and swal¬ 
lowed them. Who knows but that the infinitestimal 
bit of nutriment contained in that pitiful ration kept 


86 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


his pulse going and gave him the strength to weave 
-bout the deserted river bottoms throughout *he day, 
lternately visiting the camp and leaving it to search 
he surrounding terrain. Not until early sunset did 
he consider that his promise to Brown had been more 
than fulfilled. Food he must have, and soon; none 
was procurable there. Leaving the timber, he struck 
out across the prairies, hoping that he might find 
some edible vegetable before night closed down. 

He was merely stumbling along now, each drag¬ 
ging step accomplished by a special direction from 
his mind. After a quarter of a mile, he stopped to 
rest and take one last backward glance, prompted 
by a subconscious hope that one of his friends might 
be in sight. 

And, looking, Duval drew his emaciated form 
erect and rubbed his red-rimmed eyes and looked 
again, suspicious that he was seeing a mirage. 

For, tucked in a curve of the timber where it had 
been hidden from him when he traveled the other 
way, was a small house, and, back of it, a barn, a crib 
and a smokehouse. Walking again was an involun¬ 
tary motion, and there was a little spring in his step 
as he turned and went back. 

The house proved to be empty of inhabitants, and 
the wrecked furniture strewn about the floor told 
that the Mexicans had visited it—probably those 
who had camped in the timber. Not so much as a 
bread crumb was in the pantry. 

Then—a bonanza! A small slab of clean bacon, 
hanging in the little smokehouse! Another vein of 


ALONE 


87 


wealth when he found a half dozen ears of corn 
that had been overlooked among some husks in the 
crib! 

Grinding the corn in a hand mill on a pole in the 
yard, he mixed an ash cake, seasoning it with a little 
salt scraped from a box in the barn. Building a fire 
in the chimney, he baked his cake in the coals, mean¬ 
while using an old plowshare as a skillet for his 
bacon-frying. 

No pampered epicure ever- 

But pass that trite simile, impotent as it is when 
reactions such as Duval’s are to be depicted. He 
baked and fried and ate, then baked and fried and 
ate again. 

Then he threw his torpid body down on a tattered 
quilt by the fireplace, holding the rest of his precious 
meal and meat in the curve of his arm, as an anxious 
mother guards her babe. 

Again he slept—this time to rebuild shrunken 
tissue and revive dormant cells and glands. After 
another glorious feast at early dawn, he bathed and 
washed his clothes in a horse-trough by the well and 
dried them by the fireplace. When he left the cabin 
at midday, he again searched the neighborhood 
thoroughly for signs of Holliday and Brown, before 
resuming his journey across the prairie. Before night¬ 
fall he had reached and crossed the Navidad River, 
and still had a little food in the flour sack swung on 
a stick over his shoulder. 

Though he had seen several parties of Mexicans 
and Indians on the prairie, Duval had avoided them 


88 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


easily, and had recognized them more as an annoy¬ 
ance and a delay than as an actual menace. But, 
shortly after he had crossed the river, that intangible 
something which is the plainsman’s protection, 
warned him that he was being followed. Respecting 
that intuition, he made no preparation to camp, 
though darkness was not far off. Instead, he hurried 
on across the timbered bottom, keeping among the 
trees, and stopping frequently to examine the back 
trail. Before long, he heard the distant baying of a 
dog. It sounded first in the locality where he had 
dressed after leaving the water. It paralleled the 
river for a way, as he had done, then followed his 
trail from grove to grove across the second bottom 
and into the wide band of timber he was about to 
leave. 

Forest training again. Duval had hunted the 
opossum and the coon. He knew hounds, and he knew 
that for more than an hour he had been trailed by 
one, little as such a thing was to be expected. Better 
still, he knew the right thing to do, and bacon and 
meal had given him the strength to do it. Walking in 
a straight course out on the prairie for a hundred 
feet, he backtrailed to where he had left the timber, 
then leaped as far as possible to one side and fol¬ 
lowed the edge of the wood for a little way, hiding 
himself among the boughs of a fallen tree. 

The baying of the dog drew nearer and the animal 
left the cover, held in leash by a swarthy Indian 
carrying a gun. Two others bearing bows and arrows 
followed, all three going at that peculiarly silent and 


ALONE 


89 


deceptively rapid running-walk that is the Red man’s 
hunting gait. 

Once more, Duval was called upon to lie inactive 
while his fate was being decided, perhaps as much 
by chance as by his own efforts. (25) He scarcely 
breathed as the dog traced his route out to where 
he had counter-marched. There it stopped, then 
dropped its nose to the ground and made a little 
circle, questing the dried grass excitedly, and ceasing 
its confident baying. 

Duval’s heart sank. It seemed that Fate simply 
had ruled that he never should reach the Brazos. 
This was no common pot-licker, but a sure-nosed 
hound that was setting about it in a businesslike way 
to find that lost scent. Again it circled, wider this time. 

But, though natural hunters themselves, Indians 
are bad dog-masters. The big warrior with the gun 
jerked vigorously on the leash, hauling the hound 
back just as it was puzzling out the mingled trails. 
Grumbling and gesticulating, he urged the dog on 
across the prairie on Duval’s original line of flight. 
As they passed out of sight in the gathering dusk the 
warrior holding the leash still was backing his own 
judgment against a good hound’s nose, and Duval 
was jogging away at a right angle to their course, 
thankful that he had learned some of the wiles of 
Br’r Coon and Br’r Possum in those good old days 
back in old Kaintuck. Shortly after dark, he came to 
another deserted house, and, after a fruitless search 
for food—his stock was getting low—he ate a light 


90 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


supper and turned to in a real bed, for the first time 
since he had marched out of Goliad with Fannin. 

More manna from the skies, as it were! For Duval 
was awakened, after a time, by the grunting of hogs. 
The house was a ramshackle affair, set up on bois 
d’arc underpinning and floored with rotten punch¬ 
eons. His ears telling him that the hogs were under 
the house, Duval quietly pried away one of the 
puncheons and reached down an explorative hand. 
Immediately there was a loud squealing and the herd 
departed, helter-skelter—all but the one large shoat 
Duval had grabbed by a hind leg. 

From what followed an artist could draw a picture 
of personified Pathos, or a comic strip. Though a man 
wrestling with a pig is not exactly a heroic figure, 
Duval was fighting for his life as certainly as if he 
were battling with a dragon or facing a lion in the 
arena. 

The hog was larger than Duval had expected, and 
its drumming feet beat the skin from his knuckles. 
But he clung tightly and finally won the struggle, 
drawing the porker up through the floor and driving 
it into a smaller room. After knocking it in the head 
with a woodsman’s maul found back of the house, he 
sank down, exhausted, allowing the carcass to lie as 
it was until morning, when he dressed it as best he 
could with the broken blade of a drawknife he had 
picked up in the yard. After breakfasting on roast 
pork, ( 26 ) he packed his haversack full of the-meat 
and set out, this time clinging rather closely to the 
timber so that he might take cover in it, at need. 


ALONE 


91 


At noon he barbecued the pork to keep it from 
spoiling. Night found him camped in a timbered 
point, after covering some ten miles that day. He 
had bedded down on some dry grass by a pool, and 
was about to fall asleep when a light flashed up on 
the edge of the prairie, and a quarter of a mile away. 
Investigating, he found a log cabin, through the 
chinks of which the light of a lamp was sifting. 

Again the old question arose. Was it friend or foe? 
Not having encountered a Saxon since leaving Goliad, 
Duval was prepared for the sight that presented itself 
when he crept up and peered within. He also dis¬ 
covered the source of a peculiar rasping sound he had 
heard just before going to bed. 

Seated on the floor, a Mexican was shelling corn 
by drawing the ears across the rim of a metal wash- 
tub. The fellow was wearing his powder horn and 
shot pouch, but his gun was leaning in a corner of 
the room. It was a tempting prize, and Duval decided 
that it was worth the risk involved, so he reached 
through an opening, grasped the gun by its barrel, 
and commenced drawing it through a gap between 
two logs. 

Even the slight sound that resulted when the stock 
of the gun dragged lightly against the wall attracted 
the Mexican’s attention, and he sprang up and 
grasped it by the breech. A gun being to a Kentuckian 
what a ship is to a sailor, the American braced his 
foot against the wall and pulled with all his power; 
inside, the Mexican did likewise, the result being that 
the stock twisted in their hands till it became wedged 


92 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


so tightly that neither of them could budge it. Just 
then some dogs that had been aroused by the struggle 
attacked Duval viciously, forcing him to let go his 
hold and retire into the darkness, while, inside, the 
Mexican shouted to alarm the house. Reaching the 
timber, Duval drove the pursuing dogs back with a 
club, retrieved his knapsack and stole away through 
the gloom. Behind him lights bobbed, as men ran 
here and there, but there was no organized pursuit, 
nor was he greatly worried. Crossing a strip of prairie, 
he made camp in another clump of trees, bitterly dis¬ 
appointed that the thing he prized above all things 
other than the human companionship that had been 
denied him, had literally been torn from his hands 
at the very moment when it appeared that success 
would be his. 

The disappointment was deep and bitter and 
Duval was little more than a boy. Who can say that 
the moisture that crystallized on his lashes resulted 
entirely from the dewfall as he fell asleep under the 
stars—again doomed to hide and skulk and tremble, 
when, with an honest gun-butt to tuck against his 
shoulder and a trigger to press, he would have walked 
with his head up, ready to blast out his right-of-way, 
if need be, with good black powder and lead. 


Chapter XI 


UTOPIA! 

For the next three days, the lone outcast trudged 
from prairie to wood, and from wood to prairie, 
munching at his supply of pork, which he had cooked 
and recooked and oversalted to keep it edible, if un¬ 
palatable. Some wild onions found by a pool were 
consumed with relish, that being the first green 
vegetable food he had eaten since being left alone. 

The tantalizing sight of game birds all about vexed 
him greatly, and he determined to fashion a bow and 
arrows and supply himself in that way. 

One night was spent by a fallen tree, where he 
was forced to remain awake until nearly sunrise, 
occasionally hurling firebrands at a band of wolves 
which had trailed him during the previous evening, 
and could not be driven off. 

The next day Indians again were sighted on the 
prairie in unusual numbers, and the night was spent 
in a pole-and-bark shanty in one of their abandoned 
camps, Duval being beset by a wolf pack there, as 
he was on the following night in the open. 

Tarantulas, centipedes, venomous snakes, all 
93 


94 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


strangers to Duval, kept him constantly on the alert. 
Even the innocent littled horned toad was killed on 
sight, as he believed it to be either a tarantula, or a 
centipede, or a gila monster. Later he came to know 
all these creatures well, and his exaggerated distrust 
of them wore off. 

All one day, he saw Indian smoke signals rising 
in his rear as he snailed on, camping that night on 
the banks of the Tres Palacios. Here he found what 
he had been searching for—cedar wood, for bow 
making. Cutting down a small sapling—a task of 
hours with his primitive knife—he quartered it, and 
selected the clearest portion of the heart. Working 
late into the night, he shaped the bow crudely, and 
smiled in anticipation of future juicy roasts as he 
went to sleep beneath the spreading branches of a 
tree that was the roosting place of half a hundred 
wild turkeys. Arrows he knew he could procure from 
the thickets of young dogwood, or he could use the 
cane shoots showing everywhere along the bayous. 

Next morning the bow was finished, and its proud 
maker spent several hours trying to fit it with strings 
he made from the tough bear grass. Failing in that, 
he tried the bark of several shrubs. 

Failures all. Squirrels, rabbits, turkeys, grouse, 
gave him little more than walking room as he 
despondently brought in wood and moss for his fire 
and bed, after having spent the day in his futile 
attempt at cord-making. The cedar bow he had 
shaped and polished with such care was used as 
kindling. 


UTOPIA! 


95 


How long he had slept Duval did not know, when 
some intangible inner prompter warned him to be on 
the alert. He rose to one elbow and looked about. 
The fire had died to a mere glow, barely sufficient 
to bring out a dim outline of the bushes beyond it. 
To his ears came only the customary woodland 
sounds—little green lizards, scrambling over the 
bark of a near-by log; the distant call of the prowl¬ 
ing wolf-band; the sharp yap of a grey fox over 
across the river; the lazy, contented chug-a-rum of 
fat bullfrogs, down by the bayou; the incessant drill¬ 
ing of hidden wood-sawyers working between the 
outer and the inner bark of down timber. 

“Must be getting jumpy,” Duval mumbled, sleep¬ 
ily, then turned over and snuggled down in the moss. 
No use. Still that faithful monitor warned and 
warned and v/arned. Roused again, he knew that it 
was not intuition alone that had placed every one 
of his senses on sentry duty. 

Something, perhaps the night wind, perhaps not, 
had stirred a bush lightly just outside the dim circle 
of light. Over there by the big elm, a woods rat had 
squealed in sudden fright, then scrambled over the 
leaves in hasty flight. One of the little lizards on 
the log was silhouetted for a moment as it cocked 
its perky head attentively before whisking off the 
log on the far side. The pair of little grey-brown 
screech owls that had been working their nocturnal 
amours on the blasted cedar beside the log ceased 
their conjugal cozening and spiraled silently upward, 
and away. 


96 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


Some alien thing was abroad—something that 
Duval could feel was looking at him. The soft moss 
gave no sound as he rose to a sitting posture. As he 
did so, a half-burned chunk on the rim of the fire 
rolled off its insecure foundation of ashes and flick¬ 
ered into a blaze that was reflected in two great 
green-yellow eyes that showed among the bushes. 
Back of the eyes, a long tawny body inched forward 
a little way with the sinuous movement of a python, 
then crouched and tensed. 

Weaponless! On his back without a chance of rising 
even to his knees before the killer would strike! 
What to do? 

With one motion, Duval rolled off his mossy 
couch and scooped it into his arms. With another, he 
heaved the moss into the fire, which instantly blazed 
high. In the light, a big Mexican lion (27) came out 
of his crouch with a snarl of fright, gave one mighty 
bound aside, and was lost in the gloom of the thicket. 

A minor incident, perhaps unworthy of the promi¬ 
nence given it. Other men have been “almost” killed 
by pumas, and it may be that the pork, not the man, 
was the big beast’s intended feast. 

But—well, should you be alone in the wild and 
had awakened to find a nine-foot cat hunched to 
spring, presumably at the object upon which its 
sinister eyes were fixed; and those eyes were glaring 
straight at you, you would easily understand why 
Duval remained awake and tended fire for the re¬ 
mainder of the night, and why, when he did fall 


UTOPIA! 


97 


asleep after daybreak, his dream was of a certain 
brass-trimmed rifle of the Kentucky pattern thrown 
down on the field at Coleto, never to be seen again 
by an owner who felt nude> when unarmed, in the 
forest. 

The dreary grind continued. The search of another 
deserted farmstead on one day, a narrow escape from 
a band of Indians on another. The finding of a por¬ 
tion of a hog some marauder had shot solved the 
food problem again and carried him on until late 
one evening, he found himself on the bank of a 
broad, turbulent stream he knew must be the Colo¬ 
rado. Crossing early the next morning, he traversed 
another plain and came to a wilderness of canebrake 
that proved that he had reached the Old Caney. 

Where Duval had struck Caney, there was an 
abandoned settlement. In sight were four or five 
houses which he searched closely, but found to have 
been plundered. While rummaging about in one of 
the houses, he heard a hen squawk, and hastened out 
to investigate. Fluttering about the yard the hen 
was almost within the clutches of a hungry bobcat, 
when Duval made a bid for the prize by throwing a 
billet of wood which hit the cat squarely. With¬ 
out hesitation it whirled and charged, spitting 
angrily. (28) 

Having nothing else to throw, and the hen having 
scrambled into a tree where she would be safe for 
the time being, Duval retreated into the house and 
closed the door. After the cat had gone and darkness 


98 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


had come, he went to the tree and got his hen—a 
sumptuous feast, after his protracted diet of semi- 
rancid pork. 

Then came a red-letter day —the day above all 
other days in the chronology of that dismal journey. 
Rising late, he had followed the edge of the prairie 
until it cut into the brake, with a little lanelike 
passageway. In there, out of sight from the plain, he 
saw a house, which he started to reconnoiter with 
his customary caution. After circling to approach 
from down wind, he had nearly reached the edge of 
the clearing when five large dogs—evidently half 
Newfoundland and half bull—charged him, baying 
savagely. 

Backing away, Duval was searching for a club, 
when the leading dog suddenly left off growling and 
leaped about him, barking joyously. Tanned and 
disheveled as he was, he wondered how the dog had 
become convinced that he was neither a Mexican nor 
an Indian, but he met the intelligent animal half 
way, patting its head and speaking to it in a friendly 
tone. Following their leader’s cue, the other dogs 
gamboled ahead of him as he went boldly to the 
house, confident that no enemies were about a place 
so intelligently guarded. 

Utopia, at last! 

The dwelling was completely furnished in a style 
far above that of the period and the locality. The 
pantry was well stocked with canned goods and pre¬ 
served fruits. A barrel of sugar and half a sack of 


UTOPIA! 


99 


coffee were among the articles in the store-room. 
In the smokehouse, he found no less than a thou¬ 
sand pounds of cured hams and bacon, and an abun¬ 
dance of corn was in the granary, besides potatoes, 
pumpkins, peas, etc. In the yard, were ducks and 
chickens which no doubt had been protected by the 
dogs, yet all about were eggs and young, which the 
faithful guardians had not touched, though they 
were gaunt and weak from hunger. 

Comforts, luxuries, even the finer things of life 
were at his disposal. Pipes and tobacco, razors and 
shaving materials, soap, towels, lamps and oil, a 
library that perhaps had no equal in that section. 

As one in a dream, Duval went from room to 
room, gloating over the food stock, trying the soft¬ 
ness of the cushioned chairs, the springy friendliness 
of the beds. Then, having invoiced his possessions, 
he partook of them. An animal-lover by instinct and 
training, he first cut up a side of bacon and fed it 
to the famishing dogs. Then he dined sumptuously 
on fried chicken, eggs, potatoes, with blackberry jam 
and the first coffee he had tasted in weeks. He bathed 
and shaved and changed into clean clothes found 
hanging in a closet. 

Disappointment came but once, but it was most 
bitter. The gun he fairly hugged when he discovered 
it in the garret was a superior weapon but, alas, it 
had no lock. 

Night found the former waif seated in one arm¬ 
chair with his trail-weary feet resting on the cushion 
of another. He was smoking high-grade tobacco in 


100 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


a first-class pipe, and at his elbow a lamp aided the 
good-cheer spread by the log in the fireplace. Small 
wonder that he got out his neglected diary and wrote 
into it, in his own language, the thought that had 
sustained the marooned Robinson Crusoe. 

I am monarch of all I survey; 

There none is my right to dispute. 

From the center all down to the bay, 

I am lord of the fowl and the brute. 


Chapter XII 


THE BARRIER 

For three days, Duval rested in his comfortable 
quarters. On the morning of the fourth, he filled his 
haversack with bacon, and made additional packs 
of sugar, coffee and meal. Two keen-edged carving 
knives and a tin cup completed his outfit. 

Before leaving the house, he cut up more than a 
hundred pounds of meat and left it on the porch 
for the dogs. This bribe was to no purpose; for when 
he started, they followed, despite all his orders and 
the clubs with which he threatened them. In the end 
he gave in, rather than actually punish his four- 
footed friends, and spent another day reading and 
resting. That night, after assuring himself that the 
dogs were busy investigating an alarm the fowls 
had raised, he slipped quietly out and, after running 
the greater part of a mile along the edge of the 
cane, was congratulating himself upon being rid of 
companions who might lead him into trouble, when 
he heard a light pattering in his rear and looked 
back. As expected, he found that one of the dogs, a 
young muscular male, was following his trail. 

A clash of wills followed. His judgment telling 
101 


102 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


him that the dog might betray him at a critical 
moment by barking or growling, the man punished 
the beast with a stick, but it refused to leave. And, 
when he drew one of his knives, having decided to 
kill it, it wagged its tail in friendly fashion and licked 
his hand as he stooped over it. 

That was too much. The knife was slipped back 
into his belt. “Come on then, you consarned hard- 
headed old wampus,” Duval said huskily. A half 
hour later, man and dog snuggled down side by side 
in a drift of leaves on the bank of a lagoon—com¬ 
rades. 

“Scout,” as his master then and there christened 
him, had examined the neighborhood of their camp 
thoroughly before lying down. Satisfied, he had re¬ 
turned to nuzzle his master’s hand affectionately and 
crouch beside him with his head rested between his 
extended forepaws—on guard. 

After breakfasting, next morning, Duval spent sev¬ 
eral hours searching for a road through the brake. 
Finding none, he attacked the green mass with his 
knife and worked hard until near sundown, by 
which time he had cut a path not more than three 
hundred yards in length. Standing almost against 
one another, the canes were woven together with 
tough briers. A tall tree appearing ahead of him, he 
climbed it to take observation, and realized imme¬ 
diately that it would be the work of weeks to hack 
and slash his way through; for the barrier was at 
least four miles in width, as he wished to go, and 


THE BARRIER 


103 


extended as far as he could see to the northwest 
and to the southeast. 

Abandoning his attempt at road-making, Duval 
regained the prairie and started a systematic search 
for a passage, being convinced that the settlers must 
have made one. After exploring many nooks and bays, 
he came upon a narrow alley that led to a rustic 
bridge spanning a lagoon. On the far side was a large 
field, and beyond it another house—a comfortable¬ 
looking log structure that he found to be even better 
furnished and provided than the one in which he 
had lately enjoyed himself so thoroughly. 

All about the place were the evidence of the haste 
with which it had been abandoned. (29) Stock and 
poultry ran at large about the barns, which held 
grain in abundance. Clothing, bed-linen, dishes, cut¬ 
lery, utensils, etc., were in the house in such quanti¬ 
ties that it appeared probable that little had been 
carried with the fleeing owners. The whole aspect 
of the place was that of a well-ordered homestead, 
the occupants of which had stepped out to visit a 
neighbor for an hour or so. 

Peach preserves and honey were included in the 
menu, that night, and Duval slept in a double bed 
that was as tidy as if it had been made ready for his 
especial use. Rising much refreshed, next morning, 
he spent the day searching for a way out of the green 
wilderness, returning to his house at nightfall with 
out having discovered so much as a goat path. 

Next morning he continued his yard-by-yard in¬ 
spection of the forbidding entanglement, and, after 


104 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


a little time, took a well-beaten trail that paralleled 
the brake at a distance of less than half a mile. 
Scarcely had he gotten well into the open when he 
heard the clatter of hooves in his rear and turned 
to find that a company of Mexican lancers were 
within a quarter of a mile of him, and coming on 
rapidly. There was no time in which to regain the 
brake, and no cover on the prairie with the exception 
of a mere patch of tall grass a few yards to his left. 
Catching Scout by the collar, he threw himself into 
that scant cover, hardly daring to hope that he had 
not been seen. 

The cavalrymen came on at a brisk jog, while 
Duval lay face downward, holding fast to the dog 
to keep him from rising. Opposite his hiding place, 
they halted, and two dismounted to examine the place 
where he had left the road. When Scout growled 
deep in his throat and struggled to rise, his master 
choked him until the dog’s body grew limp in his 
hands. 

Whether the Mexicans had caught a fleeting 
glimpse of the fugitive, or had sighted their tracks 
on the trail, could not be learned from their low¬ 
voiced conversation. Evidently they were in a great 
hurry j for, after a hasty examination of the sign, 
the two dismounted men regained their saddles and 
the troop jingled on at a rapid gait. 

For four more days the baffled traveler sought to 
resume his journey, occasionally returning to his 
starting point to rest and refill his haversack. Once 


THE BARRIER 


105 


he shouted joyfully when he came upon a freshly-cut 
lane which he was certain would lead him across; 
when it ended in a sheer wall of green after a hun¬ 
dred yards, the reaction was so severe that he almost 
lost heart. 

Two nights were spent in the open, with wolves, 
bears, panthers, and the more dreaded lobos prowling 
about their camps, keeping man and dog awake and 
alert for a major portion of the time. 

On the morning of the sixth day they entered a 
little indenture that had escaped observation up to 
that time, and discovered a clearing and a cabin, stop¬ 
ping there only long enough to kill a duck and a 
pair of pullets, which were strung on the straps of 
his knapsack. Fifteen minutes later they rounded a 
spot where an arm of the cane extended into the 
prairie—and ran straight into the most peculiar of 
the many exciting adventures Duval had experienced. 

He was following a trail, well out from the cover, 
when a little way ahead he noticed a saddle horse 
standing beside the road. Seated in the grass was a 
Mexican dragoon, one hand holding the lariat which 
held the grazing horse, the other holding a lance. 
Beside him sat another lancer armed with a rifle. 
Both were looking at him with an astonished stare in 
which he thought he detected a trace of fear. 

Retreat to the cane was impossible; though he 
thought himself lost, the American kept straight on, 
neither quickening nor slowing his stride nor show¬ 
ing any other evidence that meeting Mexican soldiers 
was an unusual or dreaded event, with him. 


106 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


Perhaps it was the grotesqueness of that striding 
figure with its portly pack and bloody, dangling 
poultry. Perhaps it was the sunken cheeks and hollow 
eyes of the pilgrim that brought the superstitious 
fears of the peon to the fore. Perhaps they lacked 
ammunition, and his long knives looked formidable. 
In any event, as he came abreast of them, they 
scrambled astride the horse, one behind the other, 
and spurred and whipped the startled beast past that 
apparition in the road and neither had looked back 
when they disappeared around a shoulder of the 
brake—to be seen no more. 

Inexplicable as it was, the incident made Duval 
distinctly uneasy, and he determined to keep away 
from that prairie road. Cut through that brake he 
would, if weeks of grinding labor were expended in 
the effort. Strangely, he remembered having seen the 
head of an old axe under an outbuilding, back in his 
“quarters.” With a handle fitted to it, it would make 
a fair tool. Once more, he retraced his steps—as ap¬ 
peared to be his fate. 

And once more, walking toward the rear, he saw 
that which was hidden from him when he was going 
forward. For, when he had almost reached the house, 
he came upon a little covelike bend turning into which 
was a faint wagon track he had overlooked. After 
tracing it for a little way he entered a broad, smooth 
trail that he followed till nearly dark. Satisfied, 
Duval twisted Scout’s ear playfully and turned back, 
chuckling. 

Whew-ee! Success at last! Another night’s sleep! 


THE BARRIER 


107 


An early start next morning! The key to the mystic 
maze had been found, and- 

Scout growled, then advanced on stiffened legs 
toward where a black hulk showed on either side of 
the path. It was two full-grown bears, and a bear is 
a dog’s natural enemy 5 but gallant Scout walked 
sturdily at his master’s side as they passed between 
the growling bruins and went on. 

“That settles it,” Duval chortled. “Nothing ever 
is going to stop us. 

“First an American passes two armed Mexicans 
and they run from him ; then a dog walks between 
two bears and all they do is to make ugly faces. 

“After that double-miracle, I believe we’ll make 
it, Scout, old boy. We’ll get through some way if 
there are a thousand miles between us and another 
white man—with canebrake all the way.” 

Scout wagged his bushy tail, cocked an attentive 
ear, and bared his white teeth in an approving grin. 
Then he led off down the trail, going straight to the 
house that, like his master, he had come to recognize 
as home. 

That night, smoking in his easy chair by the cheer¬ 
ful grate, Duval seriously considered settling down 
where he was until the end of the war. The house 
was so isolated that he had little fear that it would be 
discovered soon. The temptation to revel in its clean¬ 
liness and comfortable warmth was great. 

Then came another thought. He was to be a ranger. 
He considered himself a ranger, already. No ranger 
ever was a quitter. He had enlisted in the Texas 



108 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


service, and he would go on through with it or leave 
his bones to bleach in some brake or mot of timber. 

The thing to do—the thing he had to do—was to 
find Houston’s army. Uneasily he considered that it 
must have retreated or he would have contacted it 
ere then. There might have been another defeat, 
another capitulation, another Goliad. In which case 

he was toiling straight toward- 

Ho-hum! Pretty tough, but all a fellow can do is 
to muddle along and try to do his part. 

He tweaked Scout’s shaggy ear by way of saying 
good night, blew out the light and went to bed. 



Chapter XIII 


FIRE AND FLOOD 

Having determined to resume his journey, Duval 
rose early. After he and Scout had eaten one of the 
chickens, with gravy and pone, he packed his haver¬ 
sack with unusual care, putting in enough necessities 
to sustain him for at least ten days, if rationed 
judiciously. The other pullet and duck had been 
roasting in the ashes overnight, and were strung 
over his shoulder in a meal sack, along with his 
coffeepot, skillet and two jars of honey. Ready to go, 
he put out the fire, in accordance with the woodsmen’s 
code, and, as an afterthought, picked up a bit of damp 
charcoal and scribbled the following due bill in bold 
letters across the plastered wall: 

“J. C. Duval, an American captured by 
Mexicans, but escaped from them at 
Goliad, is indebted to the proprietor of this 
house for one week’s board and lodging, 
and some extras, and will pay same, upon 
demand.” 

A fine pipe and a quantity of tobacco, a razor and 
strop, some clothing and a light blanket were among 
109 


110 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


the “extras” he carried when he re-entered the trail 
in the brake, determined not to turn back, no matter 
what might bar his progress. “Peace be to your ashes,” 
he said, regretfully, as he took a last backward look 
at the friendly place. “I say ashes , because I know 
the Mexicans will burn you, some day.” 

Three or four miles on, Scout gallantly fought a 
drawn battle with a bobcat that disputed the right 
of way. When Duval reinforced the dog, swinging 
a club he had caught up, it retreated slowly, spitting 
and snarling, finally backing out onto a fallen log 
that spanned a deep bayou. Giving ground inch-by¬ 
inch as dog and man advanced, it crossed and con¬ 
tinued to oppose their progress for another furlong. 
Then, they probably having passed the den in which 
its kittens lay, it left the trail to swarm up the boll 
of a locust—where it immediately became engaged 
in a noisy combat with a mother coon that was hope¬ 
lessly outclassed, but fought on, as only a mother 
can and will. 

It was a busy time for Scout, as the bayou evidently 
was a watering place for bear, puma, deer, wild hogs 
and smaller animals. The trail was trodden bare from 
the bayou on, and the excited dog frequently bayed 
coon and bear that managed to crowd their bodies 
out of the path to allow the strange intruders to 
pass. Soon the cane thinned, trees became more fre¬ 
quent and of better growth, and trails commenced 
branching off in every direction—indicating that open 
ground was near. Sensitive-natured Scout caught the 


FIRE AND FLOOD 


111 


infection of his master’s high enthusiasm and barked 
joyfully when, a little farther on, light showed 
through the jungle and the pathway opened on a 
sunlit circle of clear ground, about a half-mile in 
diameter—a glad sight to the eyes of a man who 
finds that within a few hours’ time he has overcome 
a stubborn obstacle against which he has battled for 
more than a week, in vain. 

A trail led straight across the circular opening, 
and they were well out on it before Duval noticed 
that the ground showed evidence of recent cultiva¬ 
tion. Halting immediately, he looked the far side 
over closely, discovering a house just inside the 
timber and in line with the trail he was following. 

“What do you think, Scout? Believe we’d better 
go right over there, or take a look at things first?” 
Scout grinned appreciatively at being addressed, and 
started on, but his master recalled him. “We’d better 
be safe than sorry, boy. No telling whether that’s 
another snug retreat or a rattlesnakes’ den.” 

Retracing their steps, they took to the brush 
bordering the brake and circled it till it joined the 
neck of woods where the house stood. Just as they 
turned into a beaten road that led up to the dwelling, 
Scout, who was in the advance, halted and growled 
deep in his throat, then stood, hackle bristling, ears 
cocked inquisitively. 

“What is it, boy? Another bear, or maybe-” 

Around a short turn of the road came a Mexican 
infantryman, carrying his gun on his shoulder and 



112 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


marching with the leisurely, yet alert, air of a soldier 
on guard duty. 

Leaping out of the road, Duval fell flat among 
some low-growing bushes. Scout, who had not for¬ 
gotten the choking he had been given on a former 
occasion, threw himself down beside his master, 
lowered his great head and lay still, as the Mexican 
tramped past them—so near that Duval could almost 
have reached out and touched him, and would not 
have hesitated to battle him for possession of the 
gun had he not surmised that the house was the 
stopping place of a band of the enemy. 

Working away from that unfriendly neighbor¬ 
hood, and wondering mightily what the presence of 
Mexican soldiers there could mean, Duval passed 
through about three miles of woodland and stopped 
to rest on the border of the brake, with only a thin 
screen of cane between him and the open. He had 
just fallen into a doze when he felt Scout’s cold 
muzzle against his cheek, and heard the dog’s warn¬ 
ing growl. 

During the minute that ensued it appeared that 
Fate itself had set about it to enforce Santa Anna’s 
order that Duval should be shot or otherwise 
butchered. 

A small band of Indians, driving a horse herd 
along the edge of the plain, were about to pass at 
a safe distance, when two of the horses broke herd 
and ran straight toward Duval’s retreat, followed 
by a herdsman. 

Plunging through the flimsy screen, the horses 


FIRE AND FLOOD 


113 


were coming on, the herdsman gaining on them, 
when Duval rose to his hands and knees and leaped, 
froglike toward them. It was split-second work to 
show himself to the runaways but not to their masters, 
but once more his ready wits saved him. The bron¬ 
chos snorted and whirled back to the horse band, the 
Indian following. Duval took a deep breath and 
resumed his interrupted nap. But, before dozing off, 
he decided that he had no chance to escape capture if 
he remained continually exposed to it. So far distant 
that he could barely make out the outlines of it, he 
had seen what appeared to be a dense wood. In the 
morning he would set his course straight for it, and, 
from that time on, would cling to the timber when 
traveling by daylight. 

Sunrise found them well started on what Duval 
had decided was to be their last daylight prairie trek. 
For miles ahead, the flat lay sere and yellow, without 
a trail to mar its smoothness or a tree or shrub to 
stud it. 

The wood on the far side grew more distinct as 
the day advanced, but Duval so6n decided that the 
unbroken level of the plain had deceived him with 
regard to its width, which must have been at least 
ten miles. It was straight going, but the constant 
brushing of the tough dried grass soon polished his 
bootsoles till walking became difficult. 

After an hour, he noted a column of smoke in his 
rear, and, assuming that it was an Indian signal, was 
mildly worried. Fifteen minutes later, the air about 


1H BACK FROM GOLIAD 

him grew suddenly heavy and hot, while the smoke 
in his rear spread and came rolling on with a rapidly 
widening front that told its own story. 

Knee deep in dried grass, without a refuge within 
reach, he knew that a prairie fire was bearing down 
upon him with race-horse speed, and that reaching 
the wood ahead of it was out of the question. 

Again, what to do? 

And again, the answer came from his store of 
plainslore. 

Flint struck steel and a spark leaped into the bit 
of tinder he had wrapped in a bunch of long grass. 
When the tinder glowed promisingly, he waved the 
sheaf to and fro till it burst into flame. Grouse and 
quail whirred overhead, deer and antelope raced by 
as he started his backfire. Even the reptiles and 
ground insects were on the move—all fleeing straight 
away from the onrushing wall of fire, and all con¬ 
demned to perish because of that stupid maneuver. 

The only profiteers of the prairie catastrophe were 
the hawks that swooped down to strike bewildered 
quail, grouse, grass birds and spiral out of the smoky 
heat with their pinioned prey, and the patient vultures 
soaring in the wake of the flame-cloud—marking 
down the fallen. 

With the man and dog, it was touch and go. Driven 
by a hot blast of its own creating, the fiery storm 
swept nearer, licking the ground bare and leaving 
behind only the agonized bodies of the creatures it 
had struck. With Scout tucking himself against his 


FIRE AND FLOOD 


1 IS 


legs, whimpering his fear but gamely standing by, 
Duval walked blindly for what seemd to him an 
interminable period while ahead of him his fire 
gathered way with maddening deliberation, and be¬ 
hind an ocean of flame scorched him with its searing 
spume, choked him into near-insensibility with its 
acrid mists. 

Then, the little fire caught impetus from the 
greater one, leaped forward, went roaring away— 
a savior to the man and dog, behind, a destroyer of 
whatever was in its front. 

Coughing and sputtering, unable to see, Duval 
plugged ahead till the heat grew less intense on his 
bootsoles and eddies of fresh, cool air swirled in from 
the flank occasionally to bring ease to his straining 
lungs. 

“Well, Old Timer, I wonder what’s coming next,” 
he said to Scout, two hours later when they were 
bathing in the muddy water of a bayou within the 
forest to wash off the smudge and cool their parched 
skins. “I wouldn’t blame you a consarned bit if 
you’d desert on me and go back where you belong. 

“Thinking it over, are you?” 

Scout splashed water with his tail and grinned 
happily. Fire or flood, plenty or starvation, peace or 
war, live or die, he’d stay alongside. 

Although the weather had been clear during the 
night, next morning, the water-course beside which 
the camp lay was running bank-full, from rains up¬ 
stream. Though the current was swift, the bayou was 


116 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


not wide, and Duval was a good swimmer. So, after 
eating, he plunged boldly in, and had gotten half 
way across, when his heavy pack shifted, twisting 
the strap of the knapsack and the string attached to 
the meal bag about his neck in a manner that throttled 
him. Despite the handicap, he battled on for a little 
way, swimming with one hand and endeavoring to 
untangle the garrote-like strings with the other. To 
add to his dismay, the bayou widened rapidly as the 
current carried him down-stream, and he found him¬ 
self getting further and further from the bank. 

Having already reached the shore, Scout ran along 
it for a time, keeping abreast of his master, then 
plunged in and came back to rescue him. 

Too late! After going down twice, and certain 
that he would be unable to rise after a third im¬ 
mersion, Duval literally shed off all his earthly 
possessions by drawing one of the carving knives from 
its sheath in his belt and cutting himself free. 

It was a forlorn camp that was made beside that 
treacherous strip of water. A little moisture had pene¬ 
trated the greased rag in which the tinder-box had 
been wrapped, and the precious stuff had to be dried 
in the sunshine before a fire could be made. That 
finally having been accomplished, Duval partially 
dried his clothes, and, after covering a few addi¬ 
tional miles, made camp beside a still pond when 
darkness came, and the howling of wolves on his 
trail warned that a fire must be started, at once. 

All night long, Scout patrolled the camp, oc¬ 
casionally giving battle to some forest cousin that 


FIRE AND FLOOD 


117 


invaded the little cleared circle about the fire. The 
master slept fitfully, rising at intervals to replenish 
the blaze and chide his four-footed companion for 
over-boldness. 

Supperless, breakfastless, with the paling East as 
a guide, they started on in the grey dawn without 
even a nebulous plan of procedure other than to keep 
going and keep foraging and keep up heart. 

Somewhere off there to eastward was Houston’s 
army—if Houston still had one. 

Anyway, rangers musn’t quit. 


Chapter XIV 


MIRAGES 
Tramp, tramp, tramp. 

Into the morning mists, with Scout now a grey 
phantom when he crossed the path ahead, now an 
ebon shape on a drab background as he lumbered 
nearer, the dreary grind was resumed along the 
bank of a smaller bayou that was dammed here and 
there by drift. Bogs, thickets, small patches of cane, 
hogbacks where dogwood trellises supported creepers, 
honeysuckle, poison ivy; upper levels with elm and 
oak, girdled by corkscrewing rattan and draped with 
Spanish moss; fetid morasses offsetting their dank 
ugliness by adorning their faces with lily-pads. 

Another sluggish bayou with a worn foot-log and 
a path worming up a gentle slope. A stark-looking 
chimney and a heap of fresh ashes at the end of the 
trail told their tragic story. 

A little rocky bluff and on its rim chips and slabs 
where cedar-shingles had been fro wed; another flat 
with a lone gum tree that had been sawed half 
through before the worker found that its unsound 
heart would make poor furniture. A little further 
on, rails that had been split and stacked but had 
118 


MIRAGES 


119 


rotted past usefulness; for the would-be settler had 
not finished the clearing he had started. 

Then the land rose; the thickets thinned; moss 
and fern showed no more; cedar displaced dogwood; 
scattered poplar towered, spirelike. On ahead a 
horizon commenced to shape—dead brown seamed 
to pale azure. It was another broad, grassy sea with 
islands of live oak and coves of sod where brushy 
peninsulas projected. 

Across the sun-glinted plain, weary Duval saw a 
placid lake, tree-bordered and back-grounded by 
rolling hills. Tempted, he halted. “What do you say, 
Scout? There’s be a settlement somewhere about 
that water. Shall we look it over? 

“You didn’t say ‘no,’ so I guess we’ll do it. We 
must have food, and the houses are our only chance.” 

It was a risk, of course, and an alteration of his 
determination not to cross open ground in daylight. 
But an empty stomach argues powerfully, and there 
might be another full smokehouse and granary over 
there. 

Tramp, tramp, tramp. That which he had been 
fearing was occurring now. The oak-tanned soles of 
his boots were going fast, brittled as they were by 
the scorching of the day before. The outer layer of 
one of them came loose, and he tied it back in place 
with a strip torn from his shirt sleeve. That wouldn’t 
last long. A soreness in the ball of the other foot 
where the leather had worn thin caused him to flinch 
when he stepped on a stob or large pebble. A cloud 


120 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


of dust rolling along the edge of the timber having 
warned that horsemen were coming, he attempted to 
run for a little mot on ahead, and found that a mere 
jog was the best that he could do. The dog’s feet 
were worn thin, too—the result of his fruitless efforts 
to catch the nimble little cottontail rabbits among 
the brush and briers—and he limped painfully along, 
favoring first one bleeding pad, then another. 

The cavalcade swung past at a distance of nearly 
a mile; but, within the next hour, three more gallop¬ 
ing platoons sent him to shelter, though none came 
dangerously near. 

“Funny, ain’t it, Scout. Some of them going north¬ 
west, some southwest and one straight south. Seems 
like- 

“And here comes a big bunch—headed due east, 
or I’m a gopher.” 

Tramp, tramp, tramp, for what seemed endless 
hours and endless miles. Then came the sickening 
realization. 

The lake and grove, which had appeared to remain 
at the same distance while he covered mile after 
mile, slowly receded, paled—vanished while he 
watched. 

A mirage! 

Suddenly aware of his weariness, he turned into 
a little island and sat down, dully indifferent to the 
fact that the horsemen he had seen going eastward 
had met a smaller band traveling in the opposite 
direction and had reversed their course and gone 
westward with them. After an hour, he plodded on, 



MIRAGES 


121 


smiling skeptically when another tree-bank showed, 
a little to the right of where he had seen the tantaliz¬ 
ing illusion. No more false hopes built on sky pic¬ 
tures, for him. 

As they passed through another mot, Scout found 
an ugly looking blue-tailed lizard and loyally de¬ 
livered it at his master’s feet. “Eat it, boy—you 
caught it.” 

More cavalry, this time small bands all moving 
rapidly to the westward. Gripped by the apathy born 
of his succession of disasters and disappointments, he 
noticed them only subconsciously, and avoided them 
more by the exercise of native subtlety than by the 
employment of studied subterfuge. 

Tramp, tramp- 

What’s this? Instead of paling and receding as he 
advanced, that grove loomed suddenly near, when 
he chanced to look that way; and, back of it a little 
way, a forest. Not that it mattered greatly, of course. 
A fellow might as well starve one place as another. 

Passing through the grove, they toiled across the 
intervening strip of grassland and entered the timber 
where they came to a deep and rapid stream which 
Duval knew must be the San Bernard River. 

Camp. 

That meant the dragging together of a little grass 
and leaves, the starting of a fire that would die for 
want of attention, though the wolf-pack came on or 
the puma made his kill. 

Duval must sleep—the only comfort that re¬ 
mained to him. 



122 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


Just after the fire was kindled, a cottontail blun¬ 
dered into its light, and Scout lumbered in chase of it, 
regardless of punishing thorns and briers. When 
he limped back on his bloody pads to where his 
master was waiting anxiously, his head and tail were 
drooped in abject apology. 

“It’s all right, old fellow. You tried—and that’s 
about all I’ve been doing for a month past.” 

Duval dozed, slept—to dream of fairylands that 
spread their charms before him, only to withdraw 
at his approach; of springy beds with down comforts 
that vanished through the hazy walls of the rooms 
in which he found them; of an oil-clothed board 
loaded with bacon and eggs and batter-cakes that 
traveled from one room to another in a cabin back in 
the Kentucky hills, while he followed, wondering 
where the old folk and Sis could be; of a company 
of rugged rangers who were riding there just ahead 
of him, but whom he never could overtake, though 
he was one of them. 

Once he woke, to find the dog’s warm body tucked 
between him and the cutting wind. 

“Good dog,” he mumbled, sleepily. “Good old 
Scout. You’re real!” 


Chapter XV 


A CABIN BY THE RIVER 

Morning sunlight lay bright on a dilapidated cabin 
at the crest of the sheer bluff that formed the eastern 
bank of the San Bernard. It was a one-room shack, 
with a single door and window, and a lean-to porch 
that was littered with the debris of crude hand- 
fashioned furniture that had been wantonly smashed 
and tossed outside. The door and window were 
barren apertures, as even the casings had been torn 
away—probably used as kindling by some squad of 
Mexicans billeted there. 

At the foot of the bluff, the swift river surged 
and sucked, unseen beneath the blanket of mists that 
spread across the low bottom on the western side. 
Here and there a tall tree poked its top out of the 
dank mass like a mountain peak rising above the 
clouds. 

Life stirred on the opposite shore. Leaves rustled 
and twigs snapped lightly 5 then two bodies splashed 
into the chill current and footsteps sounded at the 
foot of the clay bluff, then slowly and irregularly up 
its forbidding face. A gaunt, bedraggled man and a 
dripping dog climbed out of the mists and turned 
123 


124 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


into the winding path that followed the river’s course. 
Seeing the house, the man swerved toward it and 
hobbled inside, the dog at his heels. 

“Come on in and make yourself at home, Scout. 
It’s not very inviting, but we can build a fire and dry 
ourselves.” 

Removing the fur cap he had lashed tightly to his 
head with the tinder-box inside, Duval tore leaves 
from an old book he found on the floor, crumpled 
them, and placed them in the chimney, with a bit of 
tinder on top. The dog lay down in the little oblong 
of sunlight by the door to lick his lacerated pads 
and thump the floor with his tail when the master 
looked his way. 

Blue with the cold, his teeth chattering, Duval 
worked flint and steel with awkward, fumbling 
fingers till a spark caught, when he fanned it into 
flame with his cap and fed it little splinters from a 
smashed shelf-clock that lay in one corner. When 
that blazed he added the shelf, rungs from a broken 
chair, and a table leg. Later he tottered outside to 
bring oak wood from a pile in the yard, stacking 
it on until heat from the pyramid of glowing coals 
set his dripping clothes to steaming and a grateful 
warmth stole over his aching body. 

“Stay here and keep house, Scout, while I go see 
what I can find in the barn. No use for both of us 
to punish our sore feet.” 

Shivering when the outside air struck through his 


A CABIN BY THE RIVER 


125 


soggy clothing, he limped to the yard and searched 
the outbuildings thoroughly. 

No luck. The smokehouse was empty, and not a 
hen or duck was in sight. The granary doors had been 
left open and wild hogs had used it as their sleeping 
quarters, of course, picking the floor clean of grain. 
In the barn was a clutter of out-worn harness, an ox- 
yoke with one bow broken, a milk stool and a few 
empty sacks. A toilsome climb up a ladder to the 
haymow earned nothing. A heap of husks in a manger 
was searched painstakingly for overlooked nub-ends j 
but the woods rats had been there before him. Dis¬ 
consolately he gave it up and plodded toward the 
house. 

Tough. He might be able to make it on to another 
place, and he might not. Looked like everything 
was- 

Wait a minute! He remembered having seen a 
heavy hogshead in the granary. Going in, he turned 
the hogshead over and looked eagerly at the round 
spot of floor it had covered. 

More blessed manna! Between the floor and the 
bottom of the big barrel, and protected by its chime, 
was a half handful of musty shelled corn—scatter¬ 
ings that had been there when the hogshead was 
placed in that corner. 

Dropping to hands and knees, he gathered the last 
kernel and shattered it into his cap and took his 
find to the cabin where he spread it on the hearth 
to parch. He could have eaten it raw, to be sure, and 
that greedily. But the baking would partially eradi- 



126 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


cate the mold, and parched corn is more sustaining 
than raw. At best, the food question had not been 
solved, even temporarily. That pitiful bit of maize 
might serve as a reprieve—give him strength to 
tramp on for a little way and, perhaps, make another 
find. 

As the corn parched slowly, he stirred it with a 
heavy strap-iron poker he had found leaning against 
the chimney—the only useful article left undamaged. 
Though half crazed with hunger, he kept himself 
close-gripped until the greenish cast left the corn 
and an appetizing odor rose to tantalize his starved 
stomach. Then he raked the browned grain out on 
a sheet of paper, carefully retrieving every particle. 

Sitting down cross-legged before the hearth, with 
the paper on his lap, Duval had started munching, 
forcing himself to chew deliberately, when Scout 
scrambled to his feet and came to his side, whimper¬ 
ing softly. 

“The Dickens! What kind of a fellow am I, any¬ 
way? Playing hog with a pardner who always has 
treated me square. 

“Just a second, old soldier.” 

Dividing the corn, kernel for kernel, shattering 
for shattering, he laid the dog’s share on the floor, 
then turned his back quickly. 

Duval ate with slow thoroughness and had not yet 
finished when Scout licked up the last of his share 
and swallowed it without chewing, then curled down 
again by the door to resume his nap. 


A CABIN BY THE RIVER 


127 


When less than a dozen grains remained on the 
paper Duval laid it on the floor and leaned back 
against the wall to doze in the fire-glow while his 
clothes steamed dry. That last spoonful, eaten just 
before he started, might help him to- 

Scout’s claws scratched the puncheons as he 
scrambled to his poor raw feet and turned to the 
door, whinning uneasily. 

“Quiet, old boy! Maybe it’s only a-” 

A bootheel grated on gravel, outside the window. 
A growl rumbling deep in his massive chest, Scout 
pivoted in that direction, hackle bristling, gleaming 
white fangs showing beneath his up-drawn dewlaps. 

Heaving himself erect with an effort, Duval 
turned to catch up the poker. As he whirled back, the 
muzzle of a rifle was poked in over the windowsill; 
behind it showed a man’s hand and forearm and the 
peaked crown of a crumpled felt hat. As the rifle 
swung around, seemingly searching for a target, 
Duval saw Scout’s bulk leave the floor and hurtle 
through the opening, a great black bolt of fury and 
destruction. 

As Duval lunged for the door the muzzle of the 
rifle raked noisily down the side of the house and it 
clattered to the ground. There was a choking cry, 
then a strained, muffled voice calling brokenly in 
English! 

“Hey, in-side-there! Call-off-your-damned-dog!” 

Duval’s knees buckled and he felt sick and faint so 
great was his reaction upon hearing the first words in 
his native tongue that had been spoken within his 




128 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


hearing since he and Brown had parted. But he man¬ 
aged to round the corner of the cabin, to find Scout 
withdrawing his weight from the chest of a ruddy¬ 
faced man in civilian clothes, who regained his feet 
quickly and stood rubbing his throat—which fortu¬ 
nately for him, had been wrapped in several thick¬ 
nesses of a blue woolen scarf, which the dog’s teeth 
had shredded to a shapeless bundle of tousled yarn. 

“Hello,” Duval said, weakly. It was utterly inade¬ 
quate, but it was all he could think of, just then. An 
American! An apparently well-fed American, with 
a gun! 

“Who are you, and what are you doing out here 
among the Indians and Mexicans?” the other ques¬ 
tioned, brusquely rubbing his throat gingerly and 
eyeing the repentant Scout askance. 

“Duval of the Kentucky Mustangs. Pm just back 
from Goliad, and-” 

“Why, you poor devil! Here, let me help you 
back inside. Wait a second, first.” He cupped his 
hands to his mouth and halooed lustily. The call was 
answered promptly, and a rider in a Captain’s uni¬ 
form came out of the timber, leading a second 
saddler and a pack horse. 

After they had gone inside, the civilian told Duval 
his name, which was forgotten, instantly; then he 
introduced the Captain, whose name failed to reg¬ 
ister at all. 

Friends! Guns! A full pack of provisions! Better 
even than that, an extra rifle! “Great,” Duval 



A CABIN BY THE RIVER 


129 


quavered, after they had stripped the packer and 
stacked the stores in a corner. “Now if the Mexicans 
run us down we can-” 

“What say?” the Captain interrupted, impolitely. 
“Mexicans run us down, eh? Great Scott, boy! Hous¬ 
ton licked hell out of the Mexicans a week ago, and 
we’ve been running them down, ever since! That’s 
what we’re out hunting for, right now—Mexicans. 

“Steady now, till we get some blankets and make 
you a pallet.” The Captain produced a pocket flash 
and unscrewed the stopper. “Have a drink, then take 
a good long snooze—unless you’re hungry, in which 
case-” 

Chancing to glance at the hearth, the officer saw 
the little heap of parched corn. His eyes moistened, 
and he cleared his throat noisily. “Hum-m! It’ll be 
beef broth for you for the rest of today. Maybe a 
taste of meat and a cracker or two, tonight. 

“Think you can stand it?” 

Duval grinned wanly as he relaxed on the blankets 
and allowed the civilian to draw off what remained 
of his boots. 

“Reckon I can last through,” he said, philo¬ 
sophically. “That is, if you’ll let me hold one of 
those rifles and hang a chunk of beef where I can 
keep my eye on it. I won’t touch it, but I want to 
be sure it’s there.” 

Comforted by a bowl of broth, and fortified by a 
succession of steaming toddies—the Captain’s sov¬ 
ereign remedy for any ailment from a broken rib to 



130 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


spotted fever—Duval sank into a deep, restful slum¬ 
ber. When he awoke at dusk, the Captain promised 
him a small broiled steak—to be preceded by another 
toddy, as a precautionary measure against stomach 
cramps. For the sake of politeness, the Captain mixed 
two of the steaming potions, and grew sociable. 

“Well, youngster, what are you going to do when 
you get out of the service? You fellows enlisted ‘for 
the duration of the war,’ so I understand, so you’ll 
be discharged, at once. Think you’ll re-enlist?” 

“No,” Duval answered, “I’m going to be a ranger.” 

“Fine,” the Captain applauded. “And it’s easily 
arranged, too. I have a friend who is a ranger Cap¬ 
tain, and he’ll fix you up.” 

“Gosh, that’s bully,” Duval grinned. “First, 
though, I’ve got another thing to do.” At the sound 
of his voice, Scout had come to the side of his pallet, 
and stood looking down at him in silent worship. 
Duval toyed with a shaggy ear as he went on. “I 
want to find a place where this old-timer can board 
in first-class style, for six months, while I make a 
trip back to Kentucky.” 

“I’m happy to make myself responsible for his 
keep and his safe redelivery,” the officer smiled. 
“But, six months. Isn’t that rather long to—not that 
it matters, of course, but-” 

“Six months,” Duval insisted, firmly. “It will take 
a month to go and come, the way the boats run. 

“And it will take the other five months to con¬ 
vince my people that I really am alive, and tell them 
the story of my trip back from Goliad.” 


APPENDIX 


(1) Monroe’s chart and notes were made in 1833. 
Since then, storms and currents have so altered the 
bar and the channels as to make his carefully drawn 
directions of doubtful value to mariners. The map 
and Monroe’s comments appeared in William Ken¬ 
nedy’s “Republic of Texas” (second edition) pub¬ 
lished in London in 1841. Even at that early date, 
the publishers warn that Monroe’s plan “cannot now 
be relied upon. . . . According to the latest published 
authorities, there is a depth of eight feet water over 
the bar at the lowest tide.” Snow and sleet are rare 
on the Gulf, but not unknown there. 

* * * * * 

(2) The split-bullet trick was practised on the Ken¬ 
tucky frontier, and, after the Civil War, was the 
crucial test of marksmanship in some parts of the 
Nebraska-Dakota range. As a matter of fact, at the 
distance the marksman can see nothing of the blade, 
but only the dot on the paper behind it. The bullet 
sent directly toward that small target will be split, 
two hits resulting. Use of a large-bore piece increases 
the contestant’s chance of success, as a small pellet 

131 


132 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


might rim the dot without touching the edge of 
the knife. 


* * * * * 

(3) Duval sighted “great numbers of deer, some¬ 
times as many as two or three hundred in a drove, 
and so unused to be hunted or disturbed by man that, 
even when we approached within a few yards of 
them, they showed no signs of fear.” That soldiers 
should practically starve in such a locality proves 
how tightly the Mexican cordon must have been 
drawn about La Bahia during the closing days of 
its occupancy by Fannin’s force. 

* * * * * 

(4) So designated on early maps. Writing in 1892, 
Duval refers to it as the “Mission” river. It is but 
a short stream fed by Blanco and Medio creeks, and 
emptying into Mission Bay. 

♦ * * * * 

(5) Duval says: “These Indians, some time after¬ 
ward, captured several Americans and killed and 
‘barbecued’ them, which so enraged the white settlers 
that they organized an expedition against them and 
succeeded in exterminating the whole tribe, with the 
exception of a small remnant who fled to Mexico.” 


APPENDIX 


133 


(6) This work follows Duval’s narrative closely 
here as in succeeding chapters. A regrettable feature 
of his writings was his neglect to set down dates in 
his diary, and the consequent disorderly chronology 
in his book. A letter from Travis to the President 
of the Convention at Washington, dated March 3, 
said, “Colonel Fannin is said to be on the march to 
this place with reinforcements; but I fear it is not 
true.” On February 28, the Mexican, Colonel Al¬ 
monte, wrote in his journal, “News received that a 
reinforcement of two hundred men was coming to 
the enemy by the road from La Bahia.” (Kennedy.) 
The actual date was February 25. On the 26th, Fan¬ 
nin wrote Robinson, stating that, after a cart had 
broken down, a council of the officers had overruled 
his plan to join Travis. He sums up their reasons 
succinctly: “Half a tierce of rice. Not a head of cattle” 
—except those needed to draw the guns and caissons. 
“No provisions nearer than Seguin’s ranch”—which 
he would have found in possession of the enemy, had 
he reached it. 


* * * * * 

(7) Fannin’s critics make much of his division of his 
force by detaching King and Ward. It must be re¬ 
membered that the outstanding phenomena of the 
campaign were the speed with which Urrea moved 
his army, and the lamentable dearth of information 
furnished Fannin by the colonists along the route of 
Urrea’s advance. Then, too, Fannin had never re- 


134 - 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


signed himself to the fact that Lieutenant-Governor 
Robinson’s promise to sustain him was specious and 
worthless. So King went to Refugio, was attacked 
on the outskirts of that place, and battled his way 
through to the mission, where he sustained himself 
against heart-breaking odds until artillery smashed 
the walls down. Surrendering, he and the pitiful 
remnant of his force were led to a post-oak grove 
north of town, tied to trees and shot, as were the 
three couriers. Ward was overwhelmed before reach¬ 
ing Refugio, but fended off the attack until nightfall 
(as every American force did during this campaign, 
no matter how greatly outnumbered) and made a 
gallant stand until hopelessly penned in a little timber 
belt. Surrendering, he and his men were, later, 
marched to Goliad, and executed. All this was un¬ 
known to Fannin, who delayed the evacuation of 
Goliad in the expectation that King, or, at least Ward, 
would rejoin him. (The experiences of King and 
Ward, are related here as stated by Duval, who offers 
his bit to settle a moot point regarding the fate of 
King’s men when he writes, “Their bones were found, 
still tied to the trees, when the Texan forces reoccu¬ 
pied the place in the summer of ’36.” As to Ward’s 
men, they were Duval’s fellow prisoners, and his 
account of their game fight is taken from memoranda 
made during their imprisonment, with him.) 

♦ * * * * 

(8) Letters exist which prove that Fannin had no 
intention of disregarding this order. In sending King 


APPENDIX 


135 


out he had answered the call of humanity as any 
other red-blooded commander would have done. In 
dispatching Ward to relieve King, he had followed 
traditional military procedure. In awaiting the re¬ 
turn of his detached forces, or news of them, he had 
displayed that quality of loyal solicitude for his men 
which begets confidence and reflected loyalty among 
the common soldiery. Deserted by those who should 
have aided him, he declined to desert those whom he 
might aid, so long as there was a chance that he 
might succor them. 

* * * * * 

(9) This writer’s task has been to maintain the view¬ 
point of the enlisted man, who perforce must depend 
upon rumor and deduction to arrive at official plans 
and the considerations prompting them. Duval could 
see that a stop had been made. He could not know 
that Fannin had prescribed but an hour’s rest for the 
lolling cattle before goading them through the 
depression that lay ahead. It was a long way to Vic¬ 
toria, and, at best, the burdened carts taxed the 
strength of the under-fed oxen to the utmost. Fannin 
was easing them when he could. Duval writes: 
“What induced Colonel Fannin tc halt at this place 
in the open prairie, I cannot say, for by going two 
and one-half miles further, we would have reached 
the Coleto Creek, where there was an abundance 
of water, and where we would have had the protection 
of the timber in the event of being attacked. Possibly 


156 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


he thought that two hundred and fifty well armed 
Americans would be able to defend themselves 
against any force the Mexicans had within striking 
distance. . . 

***** 

(10) It is worthy of note that Duval makes no 
mention of a cart breaking down, either here, or in 
the abortive drive to relieve Bexar. Also, he notes 
the appearance of but two Mexican dragoons, before 
the engagement, while Kennedy quotes another eye¬ 
witness as having seen six. That means nothing more 
than that one credible witness may overlook or fail 
to record, something that another sees and sets down. 

***** 

(11) Other accounts state that the Mexicans 
emerged from cover but at one point, separating after 
reaching the open. Here a former condition may be 
reversed. Duval may have seen a maneuver that 
escaped other eyes, or was blotted from memory by 
the sanguinary events that followed closely. In either 
case, the operation was executed with speed and pre¬ 
cision, and was most impressive. Duval writes: “I 
thought there were ten thousand of them (having 
never before seen a large cavalry force) but in 
reality there were about a thousand, besides several 
hundred infantry, mostly Carise Indians.” Another 
informant refers to these Indians as Campeachy. 
There might, of course, have been some of each tribe. 


APPENDIX 


137 


In Santa Anna’s summary of Urrea’s reports he says: 
“On the next day he (Urrea) received part of his 
artillery and infantry, with which he renewed the 
action”—an obvious untruth insofar as it implies that 
Urrea had no infantry on the first day. 

* * * * * 

(12) “There was scarcely a man in the whole com¬ 
mand who had not been struck by one or more spent 
balls, which, in place of mere bruises, would have 
inflicted dangerous or fatal wounds if the powder 
used by the Mexicans had been better.”—Duval. 

* * * * * 

(13) Prompted by the oblique reasoning which 
caused him to cheat history by omitting names and 
dates in his writings, Duval refers to this intrepid 

marksman as “Captain D-.” By checking through 

other sources, this writer identifies him as Captain 
Burr H. Duval, of the Mustangs . If he was related 
to Captain Duval, John C. Duval refrains from 
mentioning it. Captain Duval’s feat merits space in 
history as the outstanding bit of individual heroism 
in the scant and jumbled record of Fannin’s last 
battle. Staged in a scene where heroism was less uni¬ 
versal than at Coleto, his single-handed duel with 
the Indian sharpshooters would have earned him 
undying fame. 



138 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


(14) Horton’s party became aware of the presence 
of the enemy in force only when the cannonading 
opened. They galloped back with all speed but found 
themselves cut off. After making an effort to break 
through, they defeated the enemy’s attempt to 
encircle them, and made good their escape. 

* * * * * 

(15) Duval estimates the Texans’ loss in the Coleto 
fight at ten dead and seventy wounded. In consider¬ 
ing the latter classification, it must be remembered 
that, while in this day a soldier is hospitalized if he 
sustains a pin-scratch, at the time of this fight a man 
remained in the ranks unless he had been wholly 
incapacitated. The same fact must be kept in view 
when considering the more than six hundred effec¬ 
tives Fannin’s little force had slashed off Urrea’s 
roster. 

* * * * * 

(16) In Mexican reports, the scene of Fannin’s fight 
on the Coleto is referred to as “Encinal Del Per¬ 
dido,” meaning, “The oak grove of the lost.” 

* * * * * 

(17) Duval gives unnamed Mexican soldiers as 
authority for the statement that Urrea’s reinforce¬ 
ment during the night amounted to seven hundred 
and fifty men, in addition to the artillery. It may be 
pardonable to remind the reader once more that this 


APPENDIX 


139 


work tracks DuvaPs closely, here as elsewhere. 
Other witnesses make no mention of the assault by 
artillery (two brass nine-pounders, as he describes 
them) on the second day. And again it is entirely 
possible that he set down an event v/hich, because of 
its small effect upon the outcome, was ignored by 
others. The testimony of a witness who did not see 
something, or failed to write it down, in no wise 
refutes the testimony of an equally reliable witness 
who did see a thing and make a note of it. In truth, 
when written decades after the fact, a dozen qualified 
negatives fail to outweigh one positive affirmative. 
Duval remembered seeing and hearing those guns. 
How many others failed to remember that incident 
is beside the point. Then, too, simple logic supports 
the theory that Urrea did make a gesture to display 
his lately acquired artillery to brace his demand for 
a surrender at discretion. While he must have known 
that the game was in his hands, he had tasted 
Fannin’s lead, and, perhaps, was not out for more 
of it, if a display of power would serve his purpose 
as well. 


* * * * * 

(18) Duval writes: “1 am thus particular in stating 
what I know to be the facts regarding this capitula¬ 
tion because I have seen it stated that Santa Anna 
always asserted that there was no capitulation, and 
that Colonel Fannin surrendered at discretion. . . .” 
If DuvaPs testimony regarding the agreement is 


140 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


needed, it is positive and direct, and so amply con¬ 
firmed by statements of other witnesses that no rea¬ 
sonable mind can accept Santa Anna’s version of the 
affair. Even Filisola, the Italian-born Mexican 
General whose chivalry was the one bright spot on 
the Mexican escutcheon, refers to the “capituladad” 
at Encinal Del Perdido in his reports. As he was 
second in command to Santa Anna, he was in a posi¬ 
tion to know upon what terms Fannin laid down his 
sword at last, after a council of his officers had 
decided that he could do so without dishonor, and 
with the lives of his followers properly safeguarded. 
Wounded though he was, and with his helpless 
wounded untended, Fannin was not the man to sur¬ 
render his men unconditionally to an enemy like 
Santa Anna 5 nor would courageous officers like 
Wallace and Pettus and Duval and Shackleford and 
others have urged him to do so. If anything can be 
said to be known definitely about Coleto it is that 
there was a signed capitulation. Even Mexican his¬ 
torians agree that Fannin’s men were surrendered as 
“prisoners of war”—a guarantee that they would not 
be executed. As to Urrea’s desire to “avoid useless 
bloodshed,” we again refer to Filisola, who, writing 
“in defence of my honor,” said: “For any one of 
a half dozen skirmishes he (Urrea) deserves court- 
martial and condign punishment for the assassination 
of brave men.” 


* * * * * 

(19) In a letter to Lieutenant-Governor Robinson, 


APPENDIX 


141 


dated February 27, Fannin bluntly expressed con¬ 
viction of his inability to direct an army, saying: 

. . I am a better judge of my military capabilities 
than others; and if I am qualified to command an 
army, I have not found it out.” 

No heed being paid to this letter, and nothing 
having been done to fulfill Robinson’s promise to 
“do everything within the power of the government 
to sustain him (Fannin) and his army,” on March l, 
Fannin wrote a prophetic note to Robinson containing 
suggestions that mark Fannin as an able strategist 
whose advice might well have been followed. It also 
carried his hot protest against Robinson’s supine atti¬ 
tude, and warned of the consequences. Fannin had 
been told to “make no retrograde movement.” 
Replying, he said: “I am resolved to await your 
orders, let the consequence be what it may. But I say 
to you candidly, and without fear of Mexican arms, 
that unless the people of Texas forthwith turn out 
in mass, agreeable to my plan of the 8th ultimo, 
those now in the field will be sacrificed, and battles 
that should be fought here will be fought east of the 
Brazos. ... If a large force gets here, and in posses¬ 
sion of the provisions and stores at Matagorda Bay, 
being all now in Texas, it will be a desperate game 
for us all. ... I am desirous to be erased from the 
list of officers, and expectants of office, and have leave 
to bring off my brave foreign volunteers in the best 
manner I may be able. If we should fail in this effort, 
and fall a sacrifice to the criminal indifference, cold 
and unpardonable neglect and apathy of . . . there 


142 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


are people . . . who will bestow censure where it is 
due, and, peradventure, drop a tear over our 
memory.” 

Unfurnished by the government with munitions 
and provisions, unsustained with arms by the colonists 
(he already had complained that he could not find 
“half a dozen Texans” in his army), Fannin fore¬ 
saw the end, as is shown by a letter to Joseph Mims, 
February 28: “The enemy have the town of Bexar, 
and, I fear, will soon have our brave countrymen 
in the Alamo.... If I can get provisions in tomorrow 
or next day, can maintain myself against any force. 
If I am whipped, it will be well done, and you may 
never expect to see me. . .. Hoping for the best, and 
preparing for the worst, farewell.” 

Fannin more than fulfilled his promise to “fight 
down to the last pea.” He finished practically 
without ammunition, and entirely without water. 
Even then, he surrendered in compliance with the 
unanimous request of his officers, and against his 
expressed judgment and inclination. 

(The excerpts quoted are taken from Yoakum.) 

* * ♦ ♦ * 

(20) “Goliad at the time we arrived there, contained 
a population of about two thousand Mexicans, who 
were professedly friendly to the Texans, but who 
afterward, when Santa Anna invaded the country, 
proved to be their most vindictive foes. I must, how¬ 
ever, make an exception in favor of the senoritas> 


APPENDIX 


143 


who. generally preferred the blue-eyed, fair-com- 
plexioned young Saxons to their copper-colored 
beaux.”—Duval. Employing the viewpoint of 
Youth, Duval mentions only the young Mexican 
women. As a matter of fact, the wrinkled duennas 
were equally kind, at Goliad, and elsewhere, in many 
instances hiding and nursing fugitive gringos at great 
risk to themselves. “Mother” Alvarez, at Goliad, 
was an outstanding example of this class. 

* 4 * * * 

(21) Once more Duval makes his contribution to 
history when he writes of Miller’s command: “These 
men were confined with us, but kept separate from 
the rest, and, to distinguish them, each had a white 
band tied around his sleeve. At the time, I had no 
idea why this was done, but, subsequently, I learned 
the reason.” 


* 4 * * * 

(22) The vindictive hatred exhibited by the Mex¬ 
icans was surpassed only by the clandestine-minded- 
ness which had enabled them to mantle their inten¬ 
tions. Every man of them knew what was to be done, 
yet not one dropped a hint to a prisoner. Duval 
relates that during their imprisonment, a Mexican 
officer often visited a Kentuckian who had been his 
classmate in an American college. The two revived 
old memories and chatted of the future with the 
utmost good fellowship, without the slightest warn- 


144 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


ing being given or regret expressed that the one was 
soon to act among the murderers of the other and 
his comrades. Duval also tells of a Mexican lieuten¬ 
ant who had taken a fancy to him, perhaps because 
of his extreme youth and his ability to speak Spanish 
fluently. He talked frequently with this officer and 
was puzzled that the Mexican repeatedly tried to 
coax from him an admission that he favored the 
Catholic church. Duval believed afterward, that had 
he agreed, an elf or t would have been made to save 
him. Contrarywise, Miller’s men were ignorant that 
they were to be especially favored, because they were 
not caught with arms in their hands. Those white 
bands about their sleeves, which they thought pre¬ 
vented them from being sent “home”, really pre¬ 
served them. Incidentally, the fact that these men 
were kept so marked, proves that the massacre was 
known to be impending, and was not the outcome of 
a last-minute order, as some historians hold. 

***** 

(23) Writing of Fannin’s death, Duval states that, 
when informed that he was about to be executed, 
Fannin “merely observed that he was ready then, as 
he had no desire to live, after the cold-blooded, 
cowardly murder of his men.” In conclusion, Duval 
writes: “Thus died as brave a son of Georgia as ever 
came from that noble old state.” That Fannin spoke 
wisely when he said he could easily fight his way 
to the timber after the battle at Coleto, the massacre 


APPENDIX 


145 


itself proves. At Goliad, but a few paces from double 
their number of armed men, with dragoons circling 
about, and themselves unarmed, at least fifty men 
must have survived the first attempt to murder them, 
as Duval shows that many were killed across the 
river, in addition to those that escaped. At Coleto, 
with their enemies soundly whipped, themselves 
armed, and the element of surprise in their favor, 
they not only might have escaped, but they might 
have done what Houston did so subsequently with 
ridiculous ease, and with practically no losses on his 
side. San Jacinto was not a battle ; it was a surprise just 
as Fannin proposed that night at Coleto, and it ended 
in a complete rout, the Mexicans making no stand 
whatever. Quoting from Delgado’s diary: “Our line 
was composed of musket stacks. Our cavalry was 
riding bareback, to and from water. . . . The utmost 
confusion prevailed. General Castrilion shouted 
orders on one side 5 Colonel Almonte was giving 
orders on another. Some cried out to commence fir¬ 
ing, others to lie down to avoid grape shots. Among 
the latter, was His Excellency. . . . Then, already, 
I saw our men flying in little groups, terrified, and 
sheltering themselves behind large trees. ... It is 
a known fact that Mexican soldiers, once demoral¬ 
ized, cannot be controlled. . . .” This frank admission 
from a Mexican source nicks in nicely with Fannin’s 
estimate of them, and amply justifies the confidence 
he felt in the ability of his volunteers to whip Urrea’s 
demoralized troops. Corroborating it, Santa Anna, 
himself, writes: “I was in a deep sleep when I was 


146 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


awakened by the firing and noise. I immediately 
perceived that we had been attacked, and had fallen 
into frightful disorder.” Houston says: “The conflict 
lasted about eighteen minutes . . . the conflict in the 
breastwork lasted but a few moments .” Hardly long 
enough to earn rating as a skirmish, much less, a 
“battle”—weighty event though it was, because it 
was decisive. 

4 4 4 4 4 

(24) Probably Corporal Samuel T. Brown, a Georg¬ 
ian, captured with Ward at Refugio and returned to 
Goliad. It is a lamentable fact that, though practically 
a century has elapsed since Goliad, there still is con¬ 
fusion and contradiction among authorities as to the 
number and identity of those who escaped. Portilla, 
Mexican commandant at Goliad who supervised the 
executions, recorded a total of four hundred and 
forty-five prisoners. Excluding Major Miller’s com¬ 
mand, who were exempt, and eight physicians and 
attendants spared to care for the Mexican wounded, 
Portilla states that three hundred and thirty were 
executed, and twenty-seven escaped—the latter figure 
being accepted generally. Brown’s history fixes the 
number at twenty-six in one statement and at twenty- 
seven in another 3 but a count of the list in that 
volume shows twenty-eight names, as follows: John 
C. Duval, John Holliday,-Sharpe, -Hol¬ 

land, David J. Jones, William Brennan (or Bran¬ 
non), John Reese, Milton Irish, F. M. Hunt, Samuel 
T. Brown, J. H. Neely, Bennett Butler, Herman 




APPENDIX 


147 


Ehrenburg (or Eremby), Thomas Kemp, N. J. 
Devenny (or Devany), Issac D. Hamilton, Z. S. 
Brooks (or L. M. Brooks), Dillard Cooper, Daniel 
Martindale, Charles Smith, Nat Hazen (or Hosen), 
William Murphy, John Williams, Joseph Fenner, 
Rufus Munson, C. B. Shaine, William Hunter, and 
William Hadden. Brown mentions a John Van 
Bibber as having been saved with Shackleford to 
attend the wounded; but in Shackleford’s own state¬ 
ment, Van Bibber is listed as escaped. Other names 
listed by Shackleford, but not by Brown, are William 
Morer, William Mason, William Simpson and 
Charles Spain; which appears to give a total of 
thirty-three. After allowing for discrepancies in the 
spelling of names and uncertainty as to initials, we 
find ample ground for the bold assertion that not 
fewer than that number survived the actual massacre, 
and it is probable that many others who escaped 
failed to report to Houston, or to anyone else. It is 
logical to believe that, having had their fill of army 
life, some joined the general exodus of fear-stricken 
colonists who were treking toward the “states”, and 
could not be stopped for many weeks after San 
Jacinto had been won, and the Mexicans had retired 
below the Rio Grande. 

The parenthesized names in the foregoing do not 
appear in Barnard’s list (as Brown shows it) but were 
inserted by this author to make the discrepancies 
clear. Piling confusion upon confusion, Barnard’s 
roster, as it appears in Duval’s book, lists neither 
“Z. S.” Brooks nor “L. M.” Brooks, but a “Z. M.” 


148 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


Brooks. The “Rufus” Munson on Barnard’s list of 
escaped is “Jas. B.” Munson on Barnard’s roster, as 
quoted by Duval, etc. The bald fact is that neither 
Barnard, who compiled Brown’s list (also the roster 
of Fannin’s force upon which historians must rely) 
nor Shackelford, who is quoted by Yoakum, has given 
us anything approaching an authentic record. How¬ 
ever, it is here established that thirty-three men 
whose surnames appear on the roster have been 
reported, either by Shackelford or Barnard, as having 
escaped. Eventually, history will accept that number 
—or a higher one. 

$ :|C !|c Jfc 

(25) A cowboy afoot on the plains is a no more 
helpless figure than an unarmed Kentuckian of the 
frontier period. Regarding this adventure, Duval 
writes: “If I had been armed with the poorest pot- 
metal muzzle-loading shotgun ever manufactured at 
Birmingham, I would have had no fear of them.” 
Later, he sets down: “I would willingly have given 
all the money I had in the world for the poorest pot- 
metal gun that ever was manufactured, and taken 
the chance of its bursting whenever I fired it.” His 
vast contempt for a shotgun or a man who would 
own one, was shared by Crockett and Bowie and Kit 
Carson and other great foresters and plainsmen. 
“Shotgun hell,” Carson said, when asked why he 
didn’t use that type of gun on his hunts. “Gimme 


APPENDIX 


149 


a handful of rocks, and I’ll git as much game as you 
do with one of them scatterguns.” 

* * * * * 

(26) Some idea of Duval’s famished condition is 
given when he writes casually, “I cooked five or six 
founds of the meat for breakfast.” 

* * * * * 

(27) Probably because his native Kentucky was not 
its habitat, Duval accords more respect to this beast 
than do most frontiersmen. Known in various regions 
as Mexican lion, puma, mountain lion and panther. 
It is a relentless killer of stock and game; but seldom 
shows fight, even when pursued by Man. Any small 
dog can put one of these big cats to flight, and when 
chased it will take to a tree and remain there, an 
easy target for the hunter. This writer has killed 
a number of these animals in the Colorado foothills, 
in the Jackson’s Hole country in Wyoming, and in 
the Bad Lands of South Dakota. Never did he know 
of one to charge, or hear of one stalking or attacking 
a man. When cornered, it is a slashing fighter, but 
it retreats at the first opportunity. It is not to be 
confused with its far more fierce and courageous 
cousin, the Mexican jaguar. There is a legend that 
a pair of African lions escaped from a circus and 
reared young in Brewster County, afterward inter¬ 
breeding with the mountain lion, the result being 
a blackmaned animal, lighter and more agile than the 


150 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


Nubian type, and far more dangerous than the puma. 
It is remotely possible that specimens of this cross 
strayed eastward, influencing the nature of the breed 
in the Tres Palacios region. In East Texas, old 
settlers of the flatwood section near the confluence 
of the Angelina and the Neches tell of a young girl 
having been killed and devoured by a “painter.” 
Press reports from Laredo tell of another victim 
of the puma-—also a young girl. So far as this 
author’s knowledge runs, that constitutes the list of 
fatalities to be charged against the puma—if puma 
it was. Incidentally, the word “panther” has no 
particular meaning. In Africa, it is applied to the 
leopard, in South America to the jaguar, and here 
to the puma. 

* * * * * 

(28) Before contact with Man tamed its fiery spirit 
to some extent, the bobcat—bay lynx—was exceed¬ 
ingly pugnacious, considering its small size. As late 
as 1896, the writer saw one rip the shirt and hat and 
a lot of skin off a friend of his who had entered the 
box elder grove in which she was rearing her young. 
In the present day, the lynx still is ill-tempered and 
“scrappy”, but has learned to respect the biped and 
his gun. 

* * * * * 

(29) Unfaithful and insincere historians ignore or 
gloss over the pell-mell departure of the settlers 
from the threatened district, and their utter failure 


APPENDIX 


151 


to defend their homes. Kennedy magnanimously 
offers the explanation that they were reluctant to 
leave their ranches unprotected. A school historian 
advances in their behalf the ingenuous theory that 
lack of communication kept from them the knowledge 
that Santa Anna had invaded. Yet, here is Duval, 
traveling a great distance through the heart of the 
ranch country, and finding nothing but undefended 
homes, the owners of which must have known that 
an invasion was on, else why had they fled? Suppres¬ 
sion of or evasion of the facts is not needed to defend 
the settlers from the charge of cowardice. The “run¬ 
away scrape,” as it is known, looms as an eloquent 
example of the mass hysteria which attacks the 
bravest when confidence in their civil leadership has 
been destroyed. Travis and Fannin wagered their 
lives, and the lives of their men, that, regardless 
of all political dissensions, the colonists would come 
to their support. They lost. Houston, a deeper stu¬ 
dent of psychology, foxily dodged about from prairie 
to swamp and from swamp to prairie, relying not 
a whit on the civilian leadership. He won. In the 
end, after beating a fractional portion of Santa 
Anna’s force, he freed Texas by cannily holding 
Santa Anna for ransom, instead of hanging him as 
he deserved and the populace demanded. The ran¬ 
som price was the immediate retirement of the Mex¬ 
ican forces across the Rfo Grande. To save his craven 
life, Santa Anna paid that price, and Houston’s poker 
game was won. All that constitutes no indictment of 
the colonists for not rallying. Unfortunately, they 


152 


BACK FROM GOLIAD 


had no stable governing body about which they might 
rally, with confidence. If proof of their valor is 
needed, their spirited onrush against a superior force 
at San Jacinto furnishes it in ample measure. For, 
despite much that has been spoken and written to the 
contrary, the colony furnished a goodly portion of 
Houston’s force, and Texas was recruiting briskly 
when the war ended—unexpectedly. 



* 





























LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 

































































































































































































































































































































































































































































